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THE LOVE.LYRICS & SONGS OF
PROTEUS BY WILFRID SCAWEN
BLUNT WITH THE LOVE.SON.
NETSOF PROTEUS BYTHE SAME
AUTHOR NOW REPRINTED IN
THEIR FULL TEXT WITH MANY
SONNETS OMITTED FROM THE
EARLIER EDITIONS.
LONDON MDCCCXCII.
re P£-
i
fl i n lining ■ ^MTi—"^t^ m
A TABLE OF THE CONTENTS OF
THIS BOOK.
THE LOVE.LYRICS AND SONGS
OF PROTEUS.
Song, Love me a Little page I
Song. Oh ! for a Day of Spring 2
Twenty Days 3
Love's Likenings 5
Song. Red, Red Gold 7
A Rhapsody 8
Song. Why do I Love ? 14
Pictures on Enamel 16
Adonis 20
A Nocturne 21
Song. The Death of the Rose 22
Song of the Desert Lark 23
Song. Glad Bird, I do Bewail thee 24
Song. Wilt thou take me for thy Slave ? 26
Song. For Thee 27
Triplets. The Stricken Hart 30
Song. Lilac and Gold and Green 31
Song. To Her whose Name 32
Dead Joys 34
At a Funeral 35
The Broken Pitcher 40
An Unwritten Tragedy 41
Requiescit P a g e 43
In the Night 47
To Hester on the Stair 50
A Summer in Tuscany 52
Song. Wlien thou art Happy 56
Song. If we had Met 57
Song. If I had known you 58
Song. Butterflies 59
Song. Not a Word 60
Song. You have let the beauty of the Day
go over 61
A Dream 62
Love after Sorrow 64
The Soul's Mutiny 66
Song. Think no more of me 69
Song. Come with the Summer Leaves 70
The Eviction 71
Good-'bye 72
Written at Sea 73
A Day in the Castle of Envy y-y
A Ballad of the Heather 84
On the way to Church 87
Giacinta 89
The Wanderer's Return 93
THE LOVE.SONNETS OF PRO,
TEUS. PART I. MANON.
1. Dedication.To One in a high position 104
2. ToManon.Comparinghertoafalcon 105
ii
*amm
3. To Manon. On his fortune in loving
her page 106
4. To Manon. In praise of his fate 107
5. To Manon.On the power of her beauty 108
6. To Manon. Depreciating her beauty 109
7. To Manon. On her vanity no
8. To Manon. As to his choice of her in
9. To Manon. On her waywardness 112
to. To Manon. On her forgiveness of a
wrong 113
It. To Manon. On her lightheartedness 114
12. On Reading certain Letters 115
13. He Dares not Die 116
^4. He has Fallen from the Height of his
Love 117
15. To his Friend, complaining that he
had Fallen amongThieves u3
16. He Argues with his Life 119
17. Joy's Treachery 120
18. He Laments that his Love is Dead 121
19. He Protests, notwithstanding, his
Love t22
20. On falling 111 through Grief 123
21. His Bondage to Manon is Broken 124
PART II. JULIET.
22. To Juliet. On the nature of love 127
23. To Juliet. Asking for her heart 128
24. The Same, continued 129
iii
25. The Same, continued P a ge 130
26. The Same, continued 131
27. To Juliet. Asking the fulfilment of
her love 132
28. To Juliet. In answer to a question 133
29. To Juliet. WTio would comfort him 134
30. The Religion of Love 135
31. To One who loved him 136
32. To Juliet. Exhorting her to patience 137
33. Tojuliet. Reminding her of a promise 138
34. The Same, continued 139
35. The Same, continued 140
36. To Juliet. Fear has cast out love 141
37. To One who would ** remain friends" 142
38. To One now estranged 143
39. Farewell tojuliet 144
40. The Same, continued 145
41. The Same, continued 146
42. The Same, continued 147
43. The Same, continued 148
44. The Same, continued 149
45. The Same, continued 150
46. The Same, continued 151
47. The Same, continued 152
48. The Same, continued 153
49. The Same, continued 154
50. The Same, continued 155
51. The Same, continued 156
52. The Same, continued 157
53. The Same, continued 158
IV
PART III. GODS AND FALSE GODS.
54. He Desires the Impossible page 161
55. St. Valentine's Day 162
56. To One whom he dared not love 163
57. On a Lost Opportunity 164
58. To One, on her waste of time 165
59. The Haunted House 166
60 . The Triumph of Love i 6 7
61. To One, Excusing his poverty t68
62. ToOnewhowouldmakeaconfession 169
63. The Pleasures of Love 170
64. He Appeals against his Bond 171
65. To One who spoke ill of him 172
66. To One who had left her convent to
marry 173
67. The Three Ages of Woman 174
68. The Same, continued 175
69. The Same, continued 176
70. Sibylline Books 177
71. On Reading the Memoirs of
M. D'Artagnan 173
72. The Morte d' Arthur 179
73. The Two Highwaymen 180
74. From the French of Anvers x8i
75. To One to whom he had been unjust 182
76. The Mockery of Life 183
jy. The Same, continued 184
78. The Same, continued 185
79. Who would Live again ? 186
v
80. Cold Comfort page 187
81. Amour Oblige 188
82. To One unforgotten 189
83. To One whom he had loved too long 190
84. He would Lead a Better Life 191
85. To Juliet. On her apostasy 192
86. A Relapse 193
87. An Autumn Sonnet 194
88. The Coming of Love 195
89. Friends 196
90. A Woman's Sonnets 197
91. The Same, continued 198
92. The Same, continued 199
93. The Same, continued 200
94. The Same, continued 201
95. The Same, continued 202
96. The Same, continued 203
gy. The Same, continued 204
98. The Same, continued 205
99. The Same, continued 206
100. The Same, continued 207
101. The Same, continued 208
PART IV. VITA NOVA.
102. A Day in Sussex 211
103. In Anniversario Mortis 212
104. The Same, continued 213
105. The Same, continued 214
106. The Same, continued 215
vi
107. The Same, continued page
108. The Limit of Human Knowledge
109. The Pride of Unbelief
no. Laughter and Death
111. The Pre^ Adamite World
112. A Vision of Folly
113. Ambition
114. Written in Distress
115. A Disappointment
116. A Year Ago
117. He is not a Poet
u8. On the Shortness of Time
l iQ. Chanclebury Ring
120. Sonnet in Assonance
121. Youth
122. Age
12 3* The Same, continued
124. The Venus of Milo
125. Written at Florence
12 6. The Same, continued
127. Palazzo Pagani
128. The Sublime
l2 9' The Same, continued
l -$o> A Forest in Bosnia
l 3^ Roumeli Hissar
l 32. The Oasis of Sidi Khaled
l 33- To the Bedouin Arabs
l 34- Gibraltar
l 35« To One, with a spring nosegay
130. To One, at the parting of the ways
vu
2x6
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
137* To One in a garden page 246
138. To One, on her birthday 247
139. To the Same, on her birthday 248
140. To One, with his Sonnets 249
141. A New Dedication 250
I
V
:
THE LOVE.LYRICS ANDSONGS
OF PROTEUS.
SONG. LOVE ME A LITTLE.
OVE me a little,
love me as thou wilt,
Whether a draught
it be of passionate
wine
Poured with both
hands divine,
Or just a cup of
water spilt
On dying lips and mine.
Give me the love thou wilt,
The Purity, the guilt,
So it be thine.
2.
Love me a little. Let it be thy cheek
with its red signals, that were dear to kiss ;
Or, if thou mayest not this,
A finger-tip my own to seek
At night'fall when none guess.
Eyes have the wit to speak,
And sighs send messages :
Even give less.
T 3-
Love me a little. Let it be in words
Of happy omen heralding thy choice,
•«L
Song. Love
me a little.
Or in a veiled sad voice
Of warning like a frightened bird's.
How should I not rejoice
Though swords be crossed with swords
And discord mar love's chords,
And tears thy voice ?
Love me a little. All my world thou art.
Thy much were Heaven : thy little Earth shall be.
If not Eternity,
Then Time be mine, the human part,
A single hour with thee.
Love as thou wilt and art,
With all or half a heart,
So thou love me.
Song. Oh! SONG. OH! FORADAYOF SPRING.
for a day of
Spring.
H ! for a day of Spring,
A day of flowers and
folly,
Of birds that pipe
and sing
And boyhood's
melancholy.
I would not grudge
the laughter,
The tears that
followed after.
2.
Oh ! for a day of youth,
A day of strength and passion,
Of words that told the truth,
And deeds the truth would fashion !
I would not leave untasted
One glory while it lasted.
Oh ! for a day of days,
A day with you and pleasure,
Of love in all its ways,
And life in all its measure !
Win me that day from sorrow,
And let me die to-morrow.
Song. Oh!
for a day of
Spring.
TWENTY DAYS.
WENTY days are
barely gone,
I was merry all the
day,
Folly was my butt of
scorn,
Now the fool myself
I play.
Twenty
Days.
Wit and learning ruled my head,
Logic and ecnnomv.
>gic and economy,
b2
Twenty All the books I ever read
Days. Taught me only vanity.
3-
Most of all it moved my mirth
"Womankind the world should rule.
Man, the lord of all the Earth !
He, forsooth, a woman's tool !
Cherry lip and glancing eye!
WTiat were rosy cheeks to me ?
Beauty's truth was but a lie,
Witness tomes of history !
5-
Twenty days had barely run :
Twenty years they well might be :
All my wisdom was undone,
Reason bade good^night to me.
6.
Her hair was of the red, red gold,
Her blue eyes looked me through and through,
She was twenty •three years old,
I was twenty years ana two.
7f #
Fortune, fame, I freely give,
Honour's self if so she please,
Sweetly in her smile to live
Other twenty days like these.
LOVE'S LIKENINGS. Love's
He - BS^T53^3QB5flO what, love, shall I ^enings.
liken thee ?
Thou, methinks,
shalt firstly be
A blue flower with
nodding bells
In the hollow of a
tree.
When the wind
1 blows wantonly
Thou shalt ever shake thy head
At the idle tale he tells ;
But at evening from the clover,
When the world is all abed,
And the noisy day is over,
And the birds have gone to rest,
In the darkness will I hover
Till thou bid me come to thee,
Till I creep into thy nest,
I thy long expected lover,
I thy sweet, thy honeybee.
To what, love, shall I liken thee?
Tell me, love, what wouldst thou be ?
She. I would be a white cloud lying
In the bosom of the sky,
And at noon, when Earth is sighing
For the sun my fleeces hide,
5 b 3
Love's I would bask in his bright eye,
likenings. Till he drew me up on high,
Till he took me for his bride.
Thou shalt be my sun to me.
Love, but I would be a well
In the sands of Araby,
So thyself wert a gazelle
WTiich must either drink or die.
Bend above me, love, and lo,
In my waters thou shalt spy -
All that my heart cares to show,
Thy own race against the sky.
He. To what more shall I liken thee ?
Thou, my love, shalt lastly be
A clear silver-tongued brook
Running downwards to the Sea,
And the reeds have sought to stay thee
Under every shaded nook,
And the pebbles have waylaid thee
With their bald heads to dismay thee,
Till thy pretty face grows white
Half in anger, half in fright.
See, thy troubles are forgot
In the still pool suddenly,
And a smile has found thee out,
Taking shape of thy delight,
Laughing, weeping, onward ever,
Till thou join thy self to me,
For my love shall be the river,
Thou and I shall run together
Ever till we meet the Sea.
Love's
likenings.
SONG. RED, RED GOLD.
jED, red gold, a king'
dom's ransom, child,
To weave thy yellow
I hair she bade them
spin.
At early dawn the
gossamer spiders
toiled,
And wove the sun"
rise in.
2.
She took the treasures of the deep blue noon,
She took the clear eyes of the morning star,
The pale-faced lilies of a seven^days moon,
The dust of Phcebus' car.
3-
She painted thee with dew-drops from the
flowers,
Stained with their petals, hyacinth and rose,
And violets all wet with April showers
And snowdrops from the snows.
Song. Red,
Red Gold.
b 4
A Rhapsody. A RHAPSODY.
H E RE is a God most
surely in the heavens,
W^ho smileth always
though His face be
hid;
And young joy
cometh as His
messenger
Upon the earth, like
to a rushing wind,
Scattering the dead leaves of our discontent
Ere yet we see him. Then he setteth us
Upon his back and flieth to God's presence,
Till on our faces there is seen the light
WTiich streameth from his brows for evermore.
THERE is a God. Ay, by this breath of dawn,
I swear there is a God, even here on earth ;
And see, a blush upon the edge of heaven
Bearing me witness ! There is something
changed
About these woods since yesterday: a look
Of shame on Nature's face : a consciousness
In the bent flowers, a troubled tell-tale gleam
On the lake's brim. This morning, as I passed
Over the lawn, there was an instant's hush
Among the trees, and then a whispering
Which woke the birds; and of a sudden, lo!
A thousand voices breathed conspiracy;
8
—
BHBP
And now a silence. There are listening ears A Rhapsody.
In all these bushes waiting till I speak.
THE RE is a God. I swear it on the truth
Of my new joy, which is not of the earth
But grows within my hand, a thingof strength,
A wonder to the earth, whose old worn heart
Has long been joyless. Listen, while I speak,
Ye autumn woods; ye ancient forest trees,
Lend me your ears; thou little brook, be still,
Till I have spoken, for I have a tale
For the morning's ear; and O, thou Nature's
voice,
Be silent this one day and hear of joy
Newer than thine. You friends whom I have
loved,
Listen, and stop me not with word or sign
Till I have poured my heart into your ears.
For if you spoke to me I should not hear,
And if you wept with me I should not see,
And if you mocked me I should not suspect,
Being this day the fool of happiness.
And all my blood is full of dancing motes,
And in my brain are chords of silver tone
Divinely struck to statelier harmonies
Than heaven's own harping; and my eyes
have tears
Which brim and quiver, but they will not fall
For they are far too happy in my eyes.
Tears, what of tears ? which are but new de^
%hts,
9
A Rhapsody. Newvisionsof new joys which nonehave seen,
And which are mine, ouch only Solomon
Saw when he sat upon his ivory throne,
And, lo, the pageantry of Sheba came,
Bearing its queen upon a sandal bed,
And laid her at his feet. These, even I,
WTio live and speak with you, have seen to'
night.
AND mark, how simply wonders come about
And take our hearts by storm, as in the night
Fate creeps upon a city. I had fled
Four months ago, when July nights were young,
Out to the wilderness to be alone.
Four months, four summer months among the
hills,
So far from my old life I had forgot
All to my name ; none knew me but my dog,
And he was secret. Thus, in pedlar's guise,
With pack and staff, and bartering such small
wares
Of pills and ointments as the vulgar love,
And gathering simples, I had worked my way
Through every valley of the Candriote hills.
Four summer months of silence, and the balm
Of the green pastures where the cattle go
In the long droughts ; among the giant rocks
WTiich are the walls of heaven, the ibex'
home;
Among the dells where the green lizards lurk
10
Waiting for sunrise : Oh, I knew them all : A Rhapsody.
The speckled birds which live among the
stones.
I made new friendship with each grass and
weed,
Each moss and lichen. Every flower became
Like a familiar face, and, as I passed,
The harebell nodded to me from her stem,
The gentian opened wide her sapphire eyes,
And the Ahvroses blushed. But, most of all,
The butterflies were mine. I marked each one,
As he came sailing down upon the wind,
A furlong off. The Argus looked at me
Out of his hundred eyes and did not move.
I could have counted you the purple spots
On great Apollo's wings.The shepherds came,
And brought their sick that I might heal their
woes
W"ith my poor knowledge, and I learned in
turn
Much weather-'wisdom, and some wisdom too
Fresh from their human hearts 'twas wealth
to know.
AND thus I lived and dreamed and drank
the wind
Wliich snows had cooled; and often I have
stood
On some tall pinnacle above the plain
And watched the clouds come flying on the
breeze
A Rhapsody. To tear their fleeces on the jagged rocks
Until they caught and folded me about
In their damp garments; and when these were
gone
And the sun broke through the rain, my very
soul
Laughed with the sun, washed white as a
christened child,
And all was clean forgotten but its joy.
Such life was mine the short sweet summer
through;
But when the August days were fled away
And nights grew chill, I came to Bannastal,
On the Uranian Sea, and there my fate
Was waiting for me, though I knew it not.
MY fate, and what a fate ! Oh, L ♦ . , now
I see my life transfigured like a seer's;
My eyes are open. I read plain the meaning
Of all that I beheld and heard and knew
Through the past summer, as in words of fire:
The sadness of my soul; my pilgrimage
Among the hills; each flower upon my way;
The sun; the stars; the passionate face of
heaven ;
The virtue of the earth, which expectation
Peopled for me with signs and prophecies:
All, all foretold the coming of a god.
Nay, more, each hope; each fancy; each desire;
Each separate thought which I have thought;
each sorrow
12
Laid on my heart; each unseen accident A Rhapsody.
Met in my road; each word; each look; each
choice;
Each idle dream, that I have dreamt in folly,
From my first hour till now, I do acknowledge
As the great forecast of a glorious fate,
Of hope made ecstasy and life made love.
AN D thus it is, I learned the very truth,
That God is on this earth. For twenty days
Are come and gone, and twenty nights have
been,
More sunny than those days, since these
things were;
And I still ride upon the back of joy
Which bears me bravely. Still the flowers
blow.
St. Martin's summer has brought back the
birds
To sing in these old gardens as in June:
Listen !I hear one like the nightingale,
But sweeter and less sad, and thus she sings :
JH ! fly not, Pleasure, pleasant'
I hearted Pleasure,
Fold me thy wings, I prithee,
yet and stay,
For my heart no measure
I Knows, nor other treasure
To buy a garland for my love to-day.
13
A Rhapsody.
And thou too, Sorrow, tenderhearted Sorrow,
Thou greyveyed mourner, fly not yet away,
For I fain would borrow,
Thy sad weeds to-rnorrow
To make a mourning for love's yesterday.
3«
The voice of Pity, Time's divine dear Pity,
Moved me to tears. I dared not say them nay,
But went forth from the city
Making thus my ditty
Of fair love lost for ever and a day.
Song. Why
do I love ?
SONG. WHY DO I LOVE ?
[HY do I love?
Is it for men to choose
The hour of the hushed
night when crowned
with dews,
From its sea grave the
morning star shall
wake?
Lo, while we drowsed,
it rose on our heart's
ache.
And all our heaven was red with the day's hues,
And glad birds chaunted from the trees above;
So was it with my heart that might not choose,
But woke to love.
14
2. Song, Why
Why do I love ? do I love ?
The aureole of lost days
Is on thy brow and unforgotten face;
Faith's guidinglight,the same which of old time
Sent men on knightly quests to deeds sublime
And thehighprize which was their lady's grace.
Thither I follow careless what shall prove
So only at thy knees a little space
I too may love.
3-
W^hy do I love ?
The paths of life are steep
And dark the issues, and the gulfs how deep !
This wayside shrine invites my knees to kneel.
Thou, dearest Saint, in witness of my zeal
Biddest me walk in joy who only weep,
And fare forth comforted who vainly strove.
See how my steps in thy sweet service leap !
See how I love!
4.
WTiy do I love ?
There is a dream that stirs
My soul to its last depth of lost desires,
Music of waters in a thirsty land,
A step, a touch, the lingering of a hand,
Fingers that are the soft Spring's messengers,
And lips that to my kisses part and move
With passionate words which yet, how strange,
are hers,
Pleading for love.
»5
___
_^
Song. Why
do I love ?
Pictures on
Enamel.
Why do I love?
If one had told me this,
WTien I erewhile in the world's wilderness
Wandered uncertain or of Heaven or Hell,
How had I laughed as at a time-worn tale !
Tcday, behold, I too speak prophecies
And hang my votive garland in the grove,
And supplicate my god and kneel and kiss
Her feet for love.
Why do I love ?
Ah, love, I will not make
A longer reasoning even for thy sake;
Be it enough that I am pleasure's thrall;
Tell me thy will, in song or madrigal
Or word unspoken. Bid me bend or break
And brave all wraths of E arth or H eaven above,
But not thy wrath. Ah, bid me not awake.
Bid me still love.
PICTURES ON ENAMEL.
HEN Astraledwas
lying, like to die
Of love's green sick/-
ness, all his bed was
strown
With buds of crocus
and anemone,
For other flowers yet
were barely none,
And these he loved.
16
And so it came to pass Pictures on
That when they deemed he slept, then one by Enamel,
one
The watchers left him for the candlemas;
And thus he chanced upon his bed alone,
"When the day broke. You might have deemed
he was
An image of Hope slain by drear Oblivion.
2.
The chamber where he lay was hushed
as sorrow,
WTiich is joy's anteroom. The holy night
In silent expectation of the morrow,
Gazed on the moon, as some fair anchorite
On her own chastity, until the sight
Made her heart ache. But as the morning
broke,
Down the dim lobby came Somandolin
Wrth her thick hair around her like a cloak,
Even to her feet. I wot she might have been
The dawn's own sister. Clad in mystic white,
More beautiful than awe, came that fair
woman in.
3-
Long while she stood before the dreaming
hoy,
Still as he lay on crimson cushions piled.
And when she bent o'er him her breath did
toy
\y c i
Pictures on Wrth his dank hair. Long while she stood and
Enamel. smiled,
As smiled Elisha on the widow's child
In Shunam. For although her lips were sad
As a broken bow, if you had read their meaning
You would have learned the sense that smiling
had
Was less of sorrow than of joy beguiled
To grief at the sad world and its revealing,
As when the name of Death is whispered to
a child.
4-
Doubtless that lady knew the spell to win
The life-blood back; for when she bent her
down
And laid her cheek to his that was so thin,
The shut lips quivered and let fall a moan
As in sweet pain. And next Somandolin
Put her white hand upon the sleeper's arm
Entangled in his tresses. She could feel
The curls crisp back like leaves when they
grow warm
Before a watchfire.Then she took his chin
In her two palms, and bade his eyes unseal
Their close shut lids, and laid her lips upon his
own.
5-
Slowly, as in a trance of wonderment,
Those blue eyes opened wide, as from the dead
18
His spirit stole. Old memories came and went, Pictures on
Like summer lightnings, and a murmur sped Enamel.
To his dull ear, until he deemed it said,
In a new tongue which nonemightheed but he,
"Arise and worship for behold thy bed,
" And all about thee is as holy ground/'
And then he cried, " Behold, dear love, I rise."
And, on a sudden, waking from his swound
A countenance of tearful majesty
And strange ecstatic love looked in his eyes.
6.
These things were written for a mystery
In the book of life, lest lovers in their need
Should faint for hunger by the road and die.
Thus were they written. Though a god should
read,
He could not choose but learn a newer creed,
Transcending his own knowledge. For anon,
The mass being ended,came the rest with speed,
Bearing with them the blest viaticum
And holy oils, nor guessed he needed not,
Wlio sought him a long hour.The warder told
Erewhile a knight, belike Sir Astraled,
Wrth a white lady rode the castle out,
And all his harness was of burnished gold,
Who, pricking fast towards the rising sun,
Was gone beyond the hills upon his battle
steed.
19 c 2
Adonis. ADONIS.
HE gods did love
Adonis, and for this
He died, ere time had
furrowed his young
cheek.
For Aphrodite slew
him with a kiss.
He sighed one sigh,
as though he fain
would speak
The name he loved, but that his breath grown
weak
Died on his lips. So died the summer breeze;
And all the wood was hushed a minute's space,
Where I stood listening underneath the trees.
Until a wood'chat from her secret place
Chirped in an undertone, " He is not dead,
" Not dead, for lo the bloom upon his face
" Is ruddy as the newlyblossomed rose,
" WTu'ch even yet is woven round his head.
" But sleep, more sweet than waking dream,
doth close
"The laughter of his eyes. He is not dead."
2.
Alone in that fair wood the livelong day,
And through the silent night I watched him
near.
But in the morning he was fled away,
When broke the dawn upon me cold and clear.
20
I looked within the thicket where he lay;
And lo! the sod, which he had pressed in death,
Was white with blossoms, scattered from the
Adonis.
may,
Which made the thick air sweet with their
sweet breath.
But he was gone: and I went o'er the heath,
Clutching like one distraught the dim air grey
With dawning, for a voice encompassed me,
Crying, " Fair boy, thy youth was but a span,
"Yet did it circle in eternity;
"Thy epic was accomplished. A man
" Fills but the measure of his destiny,
" And thine was all complete. Ere age began
"To mar the royal palace of thy youth
" W'ith upper storeys of less perfect plan,
"Death, kindly death, filled with immortal ruth,
"Took backthetrowel from the builder's hand
u And wrote his ' fecit' on thy work of truth."
A NOCTURNE.
2t
HE Moon has gone
to her rest
A full hour ago.
The Pleiads have
found a nest
In the waves below. •
Slow, the Hours one
by one
In Midnight's foot'
steps creep.
C3
-
A Nocturne.
A Nocturne. Lovers who lie alone
Soon wake to weep.
Slow/footed tortoise Hours, will ye not hasten
on,
Till from his prison
In the golden East
A new day shall have risen
And the last stars be gone,
Like guests belated from a bridal feast?
WTien the long night is done
Then shall ye sleep.
Song. The
Death of the
Rose.
SONG. THE DEATH OF THE
ROSE.
H, life! dear life, thy
summer days have
flown
Swiftly, yet all too
late, for they did
wither;
Joy should be joy for
one short hour alone,
Or it will lose its love
liness for ever.
I did not spare to use the cruel knife,
But cut the rose as soon as it was day,
And gave it to my love. Its little life
Passed, like a sigh, from Nature's breast away.
22
3« Song, The
Full/hearted flower, thou didst not shrink nor Death of the
flee Rose.
When the steel touched thee. No sad memories
Made what thou knew not terrible to thee,
And death came on thee like a sad surprise.
4-
Too happy flower, I would my love had died
At unawares. By such a death as thine.
I should have slain my love in its full pride,
So had it lived and been for ever mine,
5<
A treasure for all joy to ponder on,
Laid up for aye in old Time's palaces,
A "thing of beauty" which my soul had won
And death had made undying with a kiss,
SONG OF THE DESERT LARK. Song of the
JOVE, love, in vain Desert Lark.
] We count the days of
Spring.
| Lost is all love's pain,
| Lost the songs we sing.
Sunshine and Summer
rain,
Winter and Spring
1 again
Still the years shall bring,
But we aie.
23 c 4
Song of the
Desert Lark.
Love, what a noon
Of happy love was ours !
Grief came too soon,
Touched the Autumn flowers,
Grief and the doubt of death,
Mixed with the roses' breath.
Darkly the Wmter lowers,
And we die.
His torch, love, the Sun
Turns to the stormy West,
Like a fair dream begun,
Changing to jest.
Love, while our souls are one,
Still let us sing the Sun,
Sing and forget the rest,
And so die.
Song. Glad SONG. GLAD BIRD, I DO BEWAIL
bird, I do be*- THEE.
wail thee. HLAD bird, I do be
wail thee.
Thy song it was so
sweet
That E arth looked up
to hail thee,
Till wings grewtoher
feet.
But, ah, thy mate is
lying dead
24
Among the newmown hay, Song. Glad
And a fowler comes to jail thee bird, I do be'
Where thou shalt pine away. wail thee.
2.
Bright butterfly, I wail thee,
So dainty was thy wing,
So bravely didst regale thee
On every honied thing.
But thou art all too lightly clad
For any month but May,
And Autumn rains shall trail thee
And wash thy paint away.
3*
Sweet childhood, I bewail thee.
Thy smile it shifteth ever
As the ship that thou dost sail thee
Adown the running river.
But ah, life's river runneth fast
And forward lies the sea,
And what shall then avail thee
Thy laughter and thy glee ?
And manhood, most I wail thee,
Thy purpose was so great,
But the fools that did assail thee
Were stronger than thy fate,
And thy heart it was so ruddy red
That every archer knew
Where he might best impale thee
And drive his arrows through.
25
for thy slave?
Song. Wilt SONG. WILT THOU TAKE ME
thou take me FOR THY SLAVE ?
1 1 LT thou take me for
thy slave,
yw ith my folly and
my love ?
Wilt thou take me
for the bondsman of
thy pride,
Thou who dearer art
to me than all the
world beside ?
For I love thee as no other man can love.
2.
Wilt thou take me to thy soul,
For the truth which thou shalt prove ?
Wilt thou clothe me with the riches of thy
care,
Thou who dearer art to me than gold and
jewels rare?
For I love thee as no other man can love.
3-
Wilt thou take me for thy king,
While the sun and stars shall move ?
Wilt thou pay me back the homage I have
given,
Oh thou dearer unto me than sun and stars
and heaven ?
For I love thee as no other man can love.
26
.
SONG. FOR THEE.
'HAT woes are there
Song. For
Thee. From
I would not choose to words by S. S.
bear
For thy dear sake ?
Curses were blest, the
ache
Of sorrow's scourging
and griePs crown of care,
All pain were dear to me,
But it must be
A sun grown cold,
Earth wrapped in vaporous fold,
The cornflowers' head
Robbed of their blue and red,
The buttercups and daisies of their gold.
This could I choose to see,
But it must be
For thee.
3-
The notes unheard
Of lark and piping bird,
Or else their songs
Replaced by harsher tongues,
No voice to sing to me, or speak a word.
This too were joy to me,
But it must be
For thee.
27
Song. For 4.
Thee. A life alone,
One left with others gone,
A mourning house,
Wiiere none moves but the mouse
Or knows the secret of its pale guests flown.
Grief's tears were sweet to me,
But it must be
For thee.
5-
Night without sleep,
Slow hours that halt and creep,
A cheerless bed
Where Love nor lays his head
Nor looks with pity on blind eyes that weep.
Watching were rest to me,
But it must be
For thee.
6.
Passion, once sure,
With vain expense grown poor,
Cheeks ruddy white
Now crocussed with affright,
And Love, the guest, all coldly shown the door.
Love's loss were gain to me,
But it must be
For thee.
Glory foresworn,
The world's praise changed to scorn,
28
Silence of friends, Song. For
Foes gaining all their ends Thee.
Through fault of fortune and my sword un/
drawn.
Hatred were love to me,
But it must be
For thee.
8.
Life's purpose vast,
Turned to base ends and cast %
On lines of ill
Which faltering downward still
Shall topple headlong to the gulf at last.
Life's shame were pride to me,
But it must be
For thee.
9-
A guarded cell
Where crime and madness dwell,
Where murder creeps
And maniac laughter weeps,
With the undying worm for last farewell.
There let me die, sad me,
But it must be
For thee.
10.
O soul of mine!
Thou wert a thing divine,
But made in vain.
Then be thou broke in twain
29
Song. For And spilled upontime's empty sands like wine.
Thee. My soul no Heaven would see,
But it must be
For thee.
Triplets. TRIPLETS.THE STRICKEN HART.
The Stricken
Hart.
HE stricken hart had
fled the brake,
His courage spent for
life's dear sake.
He came to die beside
the lake.
The golden trout
leaped up to view,
The moor fowl
clapped his wings and crew,
The swallow brushed him as she flew.
He looked upon the glorious sun,
His blood dropped slowly on the stone,
He loved the life so nearly won,
And then he died. The ravens found
A carcase couched upon the ground,
They said their god had dealt the wound.
The Eternal Father calmly shook
One page untitled from life's book.
Few words. None ever cared to look.
Yet woe for life thus idly riven
He blindly loved what God had given.
And love, some say, has conquered Heaven.
3o
»•
SONG. LILAC AND GOLD AND
GREEN.
I LAC and gold and
green !
Those are the colours
I love the best,
Spring's own raiment
untouched and clean,
WTien the world is
awake and yet hardly
dressed,
And the stranger sun,
her bridegroom shy,
Looks at her bosom and wonders why
She is so beautiful, he so blest.
Song. Lilac
and gold and
green.
Lilac and green and gold !
Those were the colours you wore to/day.
Robed you were in them fold on fold,
Clothed in the light of your love's delay.
And I held you thus in my arms, once only,
And wondered still, as you left me lonely,
How the world's beauty was changed to grey.
3-
Lilac and gold and green !
I would die for the truth of those colours
true:
Lilac for loyalty, gold for my queen,
3»
Song. Lilac And green the faith of my love for you.
and gold and Here is a posy of all the three:
green. My heart is with it, so think of me,
And our weeping skies shall once more be
blue.
Song. To
Her whose
name.
SONG. TO HER WHOSE NAME.
| O her whose
name,
"With its sweet
sibilant sound,
like sudden showers,
Splashing the grass
and flowers,
Hath set my
5 April heart
aflame;
To her whose face,
The flower and crown of all created things,
Dearer than even Spring's,
Hath been to me a sacrament of grace ;
3-
Whose luminous mind,
Stored with all gladness of the earth and sky,
Hath lightened my sad eye
And made it wise in love which erst was
blind;
32
_ .
4» Song. To
Whose voice of pleasure, Her whose
Calling to joys as a blithe wedding bell name.
"When ringers ring it well,
Hath tuned my soul to its own happy
measure;
5-
"Whose blessed hand,
"With its white mystery of fingers five,
Each one a soul alive,
Hath taught me truths no angels understand;
6.
WTiose arms within,
Should she once clasp me to her very heart,
God knoweth we should not part,
But live for aye in Heaven's own bliss divine;
7-
To her, alas,
Who is so near yet standeth still so far,
Seeing the mortal bar
Betwixt us ever which we cannot pass ;
8.
These lines I send
Wrth my heart's tears to-night beseeching
her,
Of her dear love more dear,
To be no less to me my sweetest soul and
friend.
33 <* »
Dead Joys. DEAD JOYS.
should tremble and turn pale
To be the witness of my agony.
OAN on with thy
loud changeless wail,
Desolate sea,
Grinding thy pebbles
into thankless sand.
Oh, could I lash my
angry heart like thee
Until it broke upon
an iron land,
The very rocks
Fierce wind, the sob of thy dull pitiless voice
Is thick with snow.
Hiss out thy tale into my ice-bound ear
In sleety whispers, for full well I know
That in thy wanderings thou hast seen my joys :
My young joys, dead in some far hemisphere,
A land of blackness and colossal woe.
3;
Naked they lay, my shipwrecked mariners,
Upon the shore.
The low moon pointed her long fingers, red
As amurderer's hand, between theirprison bars
In the ribbed wreck, which hungry ocean tore
At the first springtide to reclaim the dead
And hide them in his jaws for evermore.
34
m
4-
Tell me, thou silence, what sad death they died,
Poor castaways!
"What wolfish eyes were on each other there,
"When they had eaten all that hunger stays,
And thirst no longer could be quenched with
pride?
Didst thou not see their teeth grow white and
bare,
Grinding a savage thought for many days,
5-
Until they fell upon their own red hearts ?
Thou dicfst not see,
Or Thou hadst surely had some pity, God,
When they crept gnawing to the vital parts,
My joys, which I had nursed so tenderly
In the very cradle of my love's abode.
Or art Thou pitiless as wind or sea ?
Dead Joys.
AT A FUNERAL.
LOVED her too, this
woman who is dead.
Look in my face. I
have a right to go
And see the place
where you have made
her bed
Among the snow.
d2
At a Funeral
Ata Funeral. 2.
I loved her too whom you are burying.
I have a right to stand beside her bier,
And to my handful of the dust I fling,
That she may hear.
3-
I loved her; and it was not for her eyes
WTiich you have shut, nor for her yellow hair,
Nor for the face which in your bosom lies :
Let it lie there.
4-
Nor for the wild'birds' music of her voice,
W^hich we shall hearin dreams tillwetoo sleep ;
Nor for the rest, which made the world rejoice
And angels weep.
5-
It was not for the payment of sweet love,
Though love is often straitened for a kiss,
Nor for the hope of other joys above,
But only this,
6.
That she had laid her hand upon my heart
Once in the summer time when we were young,
And that her finger-tips had left a smart,
And that my tongue
7-
Had spoken words which might not be un/
spoken,
36
Lest they should make a byvword of love's At a Funeral.
truth;
And I had sworn that love should be the token
Of my youth.
8.
And so I gave her all, and long ago
The treasure of my youth was put in pawn;
And she was little richer that I know
W^hen that was gone.
9-
But I have lived a beggar since that day
And hide my face if may be from men's eyes;
For often I have seen them shrink away,
As in surprise
»o.
That such a loathsome cripple should be found
To walk abroad in daylight with the rest
Wrth scarce a rag to cover up the wound
Upon his breast.
If.
Yet no man stopped to ask how this might be,
Or I had scared them, and let loose my tongue,
How I had bought myself this misery
vv hen I was young.
»2.
Yet I have loved her. This must be my pay,
The pension I have earned me with these tears :
The right to kneel beside her grave to-day,
Despite these years,
37 d 3
At a Funeral.
I3 \
Wrth all lier kisses burning on my cheek.
As when I left her and our love was dead,
And our lips trembled though they did not
speak
The night I fled;
14.
The right to bid you stand aside, nor be
A witness of our meeting. Did you love
In joy as I have loved in misery?
You did not prove
15-
Your love was stronger than the strength of
death,
Or she had never died upon your hand.
I would have fed her breathing with my breath ;
I would have fanned
16.
A living wind of heaven to her lips ;
I would have stolen life from Paradise.
And she is dead, and you have seen eclipse
Within those eyes.
U-
F I could know that you had
loved her well;
If I could hold it for a certainty
That you had sold your life as I
did sell;
If I could see
38
t8. At a Funeral.
The blackness of your soul, and with my
tongue
Taste the full bitterness of tears unshed;
If I should find your very heart was wrung
And maimed and dead;
19.
If I should feelyour hand's grasp crumble mine,
And hug the pain when I should grasp in turn;
If I could dip my fingers in the brine
Of eyes that burn ;
20.
If I could hear your voice call back the dead
Wrth such a mighty cry of agony,
That she should turn and listen in the bed
Where she doth lie;
21.
And all the heavens should together roll,
Thinking they heard the angefs trumpet tone,
I could forget it that you bought a soul
Wliich was my own ;
22.
I could forget that she forgot her vows,
That aught was bartered forthe wealth of love;
I could untell the story of my woes,
Till God above
Should hold her guiltless and condone the
wronsf
O
39 <*4
T
At a Funeral. Done to His justice ; I could take your hand
And call you brother, as we went along
To take our stand
24.
Before His judgmentvseat with her again
Where we are hurrying, for we could not keep
Our place unchallenged in the ranks of men
Who do not weep.
The Broken
Pitcher.
*
THE BROKEN PITCHER.
:CURSEDbethe
I hour of that sad day
The careless potter
I put his hand to thee,
And dared to fashion
out of common clay
So pure a shape as
thou didst seem to
me.
2.
An idle boy, when vintage was begun,
I passed, and saw thy beauty for my sin,
And poured unheedingly till it was done
The red wine of my love's first gathering in.
And thou, ah ! thou didst look at me and smile
To see me give with such ungrudging hand,
40
As taking all to thy dear heart, the while The Broken
It only fell upon the thirsty sand. Pitcher.
Sad pitcher, thou wast broken at the well,
Ere yet the shepherd's lip had tasted thine;
A god had lost in thee his hydromel,
As I have wasted my poor wealth of wine.
5»
Yet, wherefore wast thou made so fair a thing ?
Or why of clay, whose fabric rightly were
Of finest gold, new-fashioned for a king,
And framed by some divine artificer?
6.
I will not curse thee, thou poor shape of clay,
That thou art other than thou seemed to be,
Yet I will break thee, that no passer may
Unthinking break another heart on thee.
AN UNWRITTEN TRAGEDY. An Unwrit.
|0, ye that thirst beside tcn Tragedy,
the running stream !
Love is a running
stream, whose waters
flow
Upon the earth, and
who would drink thereof
Must bend him earth'
wards.
There was such an one
- A
An Unwrit> Who lay upon his belly in the mire
ten Tragedy. And was not ashamed. Because he deemed it
well
That love, which is the strength of weaker
things,
Should make of Man a child. And, while he lay
And summer winds were drowsing in his ears,
The river of his love went rippling by.
2.
And thushelived, and thus he might have died,
Deaf to his fellows' scorn, and held it gain
To lie a living corse unburied there
Among the reeds of Time and hidden in
From the world's stare. But fate was watching
him
With envious eyes ; and he had merited
In truth much retribution at her hand.
Alas that I should have such spite to tell.
She took her vengeance at the fountain-'head.
And made a desolation in the land.
And how he dreamed and half outwitted Fate,
Because his mind was single in his love;
And how she took the pitiless winds in pay
And set a rack of clouds upon their back;
And how, because she could not master him,
She turned the waters of his love away;
And how that man arose up from his lair,
Foul with the ooze and with a beard grown grey
42
Through his long shame; and how he turned An Unwrit>
and fled ten Tragedy.
From the sun's face to dwell among the tombs,
4-
I would relate. And, if in simple words
How some have learned the nakedness of truth,
The carelessness of God, Man's cruelty
And their own folly, it would be a tale
To chill the lust of youth and bend the knees
Of Manhood's pride before the strength of Fate,
WTiich conquers all*. And this I think would be
The sum of human tragedy on Earth.
But who am I to stay the wings of Death
And pluck a feather out and write such things ?
REQUIESCIT.
CANNOT tell his
story. He was one
To whom the riddle
of our human life
Was strangely put,
and who, because of
that
And that he could not
read it, died.
BUT a short hour
Before he passed, the woman who stood by,
43
Requiescit.
IM
Requiescit. Weeping as once she had wept to see him. born,
Tired with her watching, looked into his face
And saw the heavy eyelids dropping down,
Loaded with sleep. And she, for all her tears,
Bent for the hundredth time to ease his bed.
And,as she almost touched him, smoothing out
The ruffled pillows, close into her ear
He whispered, never lifting up his eyes :
** No matter now. I shall be soon asleep."
And then, as if he would pursue the thought
A little way as once he loved to do,
And yet too weak to catch it, he went on :
"And what a trouble it has been to keep
"This pillow smooth ! And in a little while
" It will not want another touch ; and then :
"This aching head of mine will have done with
thought.
"Thought! Thought!" But loud the aged
woman sobbed,
"Poor soul; poor gentleman."
SO they remained
For a brief space, the good wife standing there
Knotting her wrinkled hands, and he hard by
Upon the bed and breathing heavily.
For he seemed sunk again in that dull trance
Through which men often pass away from life,
When death, as the lion does, has shaken his
prey
And he lies numb and dumb and powerless.
44
SHE listened. He was telling slowly over Requiescit.
The names of those whom he had loved in
youth.
Many were strange to her; and then there came
One she knew well. She started at the sound
She had not heard for years, and bending near
Heard him repeat it twice. She whispered
hoarsely:
" Have you no word for her ?" Yet stopped
again
Because his eyes were open. Doubtingly
They wandered to her own and seemed to say
" W^ho, and what is it that you ask?" And she
Spoke it again. He seemed to catch the name
And said it after her, but like a child
"Which knows not what it speaks ; and after/
wards :
44 Ah ! Bridget, I have quite forgot that story,
"And now, in half an hour, it is not long,
14 1 shall have clean forgotten the name too."
She cried, "Oh, Sir! it is a life too late.
"Would God, you had forgot it long ago I"
THE tears stole slowly down her withered
cheeks
And fell upon his hands. She did not move
"Whilehewent murmuring on : "'Tis very well
" Thus to forget. And what a wonder too
" It now is" (and there came a sudden light
Into his eyes) "that one should ever care
45
Rcquiescit. "To recollect a single day of life.
" I used to think and plan and plot and scheme
" How I might build my life in such a way
"That I should take fine memories to my grave.
" And now what a small matter 'tis to know
" How the years went: when death in half an
hour
" Is all that is left of them ! No matter now,
** But only to sleep sound in any bed
"And have no dreams."
HISeyes grew dim again
As he ceased speaking; and the woman knew
That he was dying. "He is gone," she said.
And then she started muttering half aloud,
"They cannot pass without the sacraments,
"These gentlefolks" : and so she hurried out.
TH E dying man smiled.
W^HENthey came again
She whispered in his ear, and looking down
Saw him still smiling; so she lit in haste
A candle by the bed and knelt aside.
They put the holy oils upon his hands,
Which closed upon the fingers of the priest.
The priest bent over him and laid his ear
To the half open mouth and presently,
Thinkinghe heard some words, gave absolution.
But, when they would have gone on with the
rest,
They found that he was dead.
46
THEY buried him Rcquicscit.
Wrth some smallpomp to comfortthe old dame,
Wlio said her master was a gentleman
And must be followed with a mourning coach
And mutes and weepers. There was no one else.
HIS name is cut upon a stone. His dreams
Were written on Time's hem; and Time has
fled
And taken him and them. The grass is green
Upon his grave. I cannot doubt he sleeps.
IN THE NIGHT.
In the Night.
H E RE art thou, thou
lost face,
Which, yet a little
while, wert making
mirth
At these new years
which seemed too sad
to be?
Where art thou fled
which for a minute's
space
Shut out the world and wert my world to me ?
And now a corner of this idle Earth,
A broken shadow by the day forgot,
Is wide enough to be thy hiding-place,
47
In the Night. And thou art shrunk away and needest not
The darkness of this night to cover thee.
2.
WTiere art thou hidden ? In the boundless air
My hands go forth to thee, and search and feel
As through the universe. I hold the night
Caught in my arms, and yet thou art not there.
Where art thou? Whatif I should strike a light
So suddenly that thou couldst never steal
Back to thy shadows ? "What if I should find
Thee standing close to me with all thy hair
Trailing about me and thy eyes grown blind
With looking at me vainly through the night?
3- •
There are three rings upon thy hand to-night,
One with a sapphire stone, and one there is
Coiled like a snake, and one on which myname
Is written in strange gems. By this dim light
I cannot read if it be writ the same.
See, I have worn no other ring but this !
Why dost thou look at it with eyes estranged ?
Is it not thine? Ah, God! thou readest right I
And it is changed, and thou and I are changed,
And I have written there another name.
4.
Oh, happiness, how has it slipped away!
We, who once lived and held it in our hand !
What is the rest that these new years can bring ?
48
Did we not love it in our love's to-day, In the Night-
And pleasure which was so divine a thing,
The sweetest and most strange to understand ?
And that is why it left regret behind,
As though a wild bird suddenly should stay
A moment at our side and we should find
When we looked up that it had taken wing.
5-
And thou, hast thou forgotten how to love?
Hast thou no kissing in thy lips ? Thy tongue,
Has it no secret whisper for my ear ?
I have been watching thee to see thee move
A little closer to my side in fear
Of the long night. Oh, there is room among
The pillows for thy head if thou wouldst sleep,
And thou art cold, and I would wrap my love
To my warm breast and so my vigil keep,
And be alone with darkness and with her.
6.
Thou standest with thy hand upon my heart,
As once thou used to stand, to feel it beat;
Doth it beat calmer now than in those days ?
Thy foolish finger-tips will leave a smart
If they so press upon my side. Thy gaze
Is burning me. Oh, speak a word and cheat
This darkness into pain, if pain must be,
And wake me back to sorrow with a start,
For I am weary of the night and thee,
And thy strange silence and thy stranger face.
49 el
.
In the Night.
7-
Canst thou not speak ? Thy tale was but begun,
How can I answer thee a tale untold ?
WTiisper it quick before the morning break.
How loud thou weepest! Listen, there is one
Dreaming beside me who must not awake.
Close in my ear! Ah, child, thy lips are cold,
Because thou art forsaken : Misery!
Is there not room enough beneath the sun
For her, and thee, and me ? . . .
ToHesteron TO HESTER ON THE STAIR.
the Stair.
Watching me in mute surprise,
Me, your father, only me.
ESTER, creature of
my love,
"What is this ? You love
not me?
On the stair you stand
above,
Looking down dis^
trustfully
Wrth the corners of
your eyes
2.
Hester, why this foolish terror,
You who know me and my ways ?
Was my love so writ in error
50
That it needed your disgrace ?
Is your doubt or locks grown thin,
Or the beard which hides his chin,
His, your father's chin and face ?
To Hester on
the Stair.
Hester, we were fools of passion
When our last good-byes were smiled.
Now you stand in your strange fashion
By my kisses unbeguiled,
Wrth your light foot turned to flee
While I press you to my knee,
You, my child, my only child.
4-
Listen, Hester, I am able
Still to flatter and be fond :
You the wise crow of the fable
Perched above me and beyond.
Foolish ! Not one word you speak
To my praises of your cheek,
Not one sound, one only sound!
Be it so. My love you mock it,
And my sighs are empty wind.
See, I shut my heart and lock it
From your laughing eyes unkind.
Yet, remember this last word,
Love is two-edged like a sword.
Mind this only, only mind.
51
e 2
A Summer A SUMMER IN TUSCANY,
in Tuscany.
You and the rest and I ?
you remember,
Lucy,
How, in the days
gone by
We spent a summer
together,
A summer in Tus*-
cany,
In the chestnut
woods by the river,
2.
Your house had the largest garden,
But ours was next to the bridge,
And we had a mulberry alley
WTiich sloped to the water's edge.
You were always talking and laughing
On your side of the hedge.
i
How many sisters and brothers,
Lucy, then did you own ?
Harriet and Francis and Horace,
And Phyllis, a flower half-blown.
I liked you more than the others,
For you had the longest gown.
4- •
What has become of the laughter ?
What of the mulberry /-trees?
52
*^m
-
_.
j.
d
Is there no record in heaven, A Summer
No echo of days like these ? in Tuscany.
Francis is married and happy
And Horace beyond the seas.
5-
Phyllis was first to desert us,
She had no soul for the Earth
But lingered a guest impatient
Alike of our sorrow and mirth.
Death's step to her on the threshold
Seemed news of a glorious birth.
6.
Harriet, whose eyes were the brightest,
The fullest of innocent guile,
Has hidden her joy and our sorrow
Under a Carmelite veil.
They call her the "mother abbess."
She nardly remembers to smile.
7-
Do you remember the ponies
We used to ride on the hill,
Every knee of them broken,
Every back like a quill,
Cesare, Capitano,
Milor and Jack and Jill ?
8.
High o'er the plains and the valleys,
Wnerever our leader led,
53
A Summer We two, closest of allies,
in Tuscany. Were with him still in his tread,
Sworn to be first on his footsteps,
To serve him alive or dead.
9-
Dead : ah, dead ! WTio could think it ?
The laughter so strong on his lips
Had seemed an elixir of living.
WTiere now are his jibes and his quips ?
The fair paradoxes he flung us ?
The fire of him ? Lost in eclipse !
to.
All are scattered and vanished,
Laughter and smiles and tears,
Gone with the dust on the sandals
WTiich cling to the feet of the years.
Time has no time to remember,
And fortune no face for our fears.
11
Do you remember, Lucy,
The day which, too soon, had come,
The first sad day of the Autumn,
The last of our summer home,
The day of my journey to England,
And yours to your convent at Rome ?
12.
We rose with the dawn that morning,
(The others were hardly awake)
54
i
And took our walk by the river. A Summer
Lucy, did your heart ache ? in Tuscany.
Or was it the chill of the sunrise
That made you shiver and shake ?
13-
Lucy, the dog«rose you gave me
Still lies in its secret place.
Lucy, the tears, my fool's answer,
Have left on my cheeks a trace.
The kiss you gave me at parting
I yet can reel on my face.
t ,4 * /
These are the things I remember.
These are the things that I grieve,
The joys that are scattered and vanished,
The friends I am loath to leave.
I grudge them to death and silence
And age which is death's reprieve.
15.
Vanished, forgotten and scattered,
All but you, Lucy, and I,
"Who cling some moments together
Till Time shall have hurried us by :
A moment and yet a moment,
Till we too forget and die !
55 e 4
Song, If we
had met.
Too late ! Too sad ! A year ago,
Even then perhaps, in spite of fate,
It might have been, but, ah, not now,
I dare not love you, 'tis too late.
Song.Iflhad SONG. IF I HAD KNOWN YOU.
known you.
g^F I had known you:
oh, if I had known
you:
In other days when
youth and love were
strong,
I would have raised a
temple to enthrone you
On some fair pinnacle
of cloudless song.
2,
If you had touched me then with your dear
laughter,
As now its echo smites me in my grief,
I would have given my soul to you, and after
Lived in my love, grown old in my belief.
Z>'
If you had loved me: oh, you would have loved
me:
Earth would have worshipped us, its seers
sublime,
My song had been a psalm, and Saints had
proved me
Prophet and priest, your poet for all time.
58
SONG. BUTTERFLIES. Song.
CHILDofJoy!what Butterflies,
j idle life is thine! f r °T/S
Thou, in these mea, b / M ' b *
dows, while thy skies
are blue,
And while thy joys
I are new to thee like
I wine,
Chasest mad butter^
flies as children do.
And, lo, thou turnest from them to repine,
Because it was not love thou didst pursue.
2.
O Child of Hope! thou sighestthy sad sighs,
Mourning for that which is not nor can be.
Wliere is the noon can match with thy sunrise?
^X/hose is the heart shall win thy constancy ?
Thou, with thy foolish loves, mad butterflies,
WTiat dost thou ask of my sad heart and me ?
O Child of Love ! begotten for man's bliss !
O Child of Pleasure ! nursed for thy own pain !
Needs must I weep the day of thy distress,
The fate that brushes at thy arm in vain,
Thy skies of blue, thy broken happiness,
The hopes thou chasest never to attain.
59
Song. Not a SONG. NOT A WORD.
■ m ■i. ^-^«^OVE,my heart is faint
with waiting,
Faint with hope and
joy deferred,
All night long at this
sad grating,
Sleepless like a
prisoned bird.
Singing low,
Singing slow,
Come, ah ! come, love. Not a word !
2.
Love, in vain for thee this token
Did I tie, poor silken cord,
To my window. See, 'tis broken
And the strands fly heavenward.
All are free,
All but me,
Come, ah ! come, love. Not a word !
Lo, the first sad streak of morning
Cleaves the heaven like a sword;
Love, too late I hear the warning
Of thy footstep on the sward.
Yet, ah! yet,
Though 'tis late,
Come; but mind, love, not a word !
60
SONG. YOU HAVE LET THE
BEAUTY OF THE DAY GO OVER.
jOU have let the
beauty of the day-
go over,
You have let the glory
of the noon go by.
Clouds from the West
have gathered close
and cover
All but a remnant now
1 of our proud sky.
2.
Dumbly the rain beats on our darkened faces.
Hushed are the woods. Alas, for us no bird
Shall sing to-day of pleasure in green places,
No touch shall thrill, no soul of leaves bestirred.
3-
Why did we wait? What faith was ours in
fortune ?
What was our pride that fate should kneel to us?
Oh, we were fools. Love loves not to importune,
And he is silent here in this sad house.
4-
Alas, dear love, the day for us is ended,
The pleasure of green fields, of streams, of skies;
One hour remains, one only of joy blended
With coming night; ah ! seize it ere it flies.
6i
Song. You
have let the
beauty of the
day go over.
-—-^*^=^
Song. You 5.
have let the Draw fast the curtains. Close the door on
beauty of the sorrow,
day go over. Shut out the dusk, it only makes us grieve ;
Here we may live a life, and then, to-morrow,
If fate still wills it, we may take our leave.
A Dream. A DREAM.
jSs*
OS
DREAMED
A dream of you,
Not as you seemed
Wlien you were late
unkind,
And blind
To my eyes pleading
for a debt long due,
But touched and true
And all inclined
To tenderest fancies on love's inmost theme.
How sweet you were to me, and, ah, how kind
In that dear dream !
2.
I felt
Your lips on mine
Mingle and melt,
And your cheek touch my cheek,
I, weak
With vain desires and askings for a sign
62
Of love divine, A Dream.
Found my grief break,
And wept and wept in an unending stream
Of sudden joy set free, yet could not speak,
Dumb in my dream.
3-
I knew
You loved me then,
And I knew too
The bliss of souls in Heaven
Newshriven,
Who look with pity on still sinning men,
And turn again
To be forgiven
In the dear arms of their God holding them,
And spend themselves in praise from morn
till even,
Nor break their dream.
4-
I woke
In my mid bliss
At midnight's stroke,
And knew you lost and gone.
Forlorn
I called you back to my unfinished kiss,
But only this,
One word of scorn,
You answered me: "'Twas better loved to seem
" Than loved to be," since all love is forsworn,
Always a dream.
63
^ -
^r
Love after
Sorrow.
LOVE AFTER SORROW.
|EHOLD,thishourI
love, as in the glory
ofmorn. 8 -
I too, the accursed
one, whom griefs
pursue
Like phantoms
through a land of
deaths forlorn,
Have felt my heart
leap up with courage new.
2.
Behold, I love. The tragedy of hate's derision
Has like a storm-cloud vanished and is done;
High in its path my hope has burst its prison,
And stands transfigured, a resplendent sun.
3-
Where are the ghosts of sorrow that beset my
road,
The foes that mocked, the fools that fled from
me?
Peace be theirportion,all who soughtmy blood;
I care not for fear's bondage, who am free.
4-
O days of youth renewed! Love's voice, a
singing bird's,
Thrills me to tears more sweet than laughters
are:
64
His silence godlike speaks to me in words Love after
Dearer than minstrelsy in lands afar. Sorrow.
5-
These halls, erewhile of pride, my sorrow's
palaces,
Are decked for joy, and with high pomps and
shows
Proclaim his lordship of all life that is
In passionate echoes of remembered vows.
6.
The gardens are grown thick once more with
scent of flowers,
Moss-roses by the wall, sweet lavenders,
Larkspurs, red lilies : who shall tell what dowers
Of musks and mallows golden shall be hers ?
7-
Hers ? Whose ? Oh, if a tongue should tell of
dreams unwise,
And love might blazon love to ears abroad,
How would I speak ! But let this word suffice,
That to my lips one name leaps like a sword;
8.
And mat I live once more and love all sentient
things,
The spirit of the Earth, and the Sun's fire,
And the night's silence and hushed wanderings,
And her who is the soul of my desire.
65 .'ft
The Soul's THE SOUL'S MUTINY.
Bg2SS35585?IS5l SAW a galley pass^
ing to the West,
Its silken sails aglow
as if with blood,
WTien the red sun
dropped down into his
nest,
And hurled his level
spears across the flood,
And at its prow a
mighty woman stood
With braided locks of blackest ebony,
While from thethick-'fringed eyes her haughty
mood
Flashed forth in all disdainful majesty.
2.
For she was tall and vestured like a queen,
And from her shoulders in imperial fold
A striped tunic, wrought of black and green
Wrth strange device of dragons manifold,
Fell to her waist and rippled o'er with gold,
Where caught up in a girdle loosely bound,
Then freely down in potent masses rolled
And clung about her feet and clasped the
ground.
•3-
And ever and anon, with gracious smile
Lighting the royal sculpture of her face,
66
She gave commands. And each his joyful toil The Soul s
Plied at her word, and with redoubled grace Mutiny.
Bent to his oar, and working still in place
Did all her bidding. And the ship moved on
As one which, wagered in a mighty race,
Sailed surely to the front and surely won.
4-
And next I saw a slender child who seemed
Sprung from the river gods' unearthly dew,
And in his face the light of wisdom gleamed
And round about in flashing circles flew.
And he arose and whispered to the few
Who sat beside him, and to each in turn
He told his counsel thus to all the crew
In honied words which I had wished to learn.
5-
And at his voice each rower dropped his oar,
And the sail flapped unguided on the mast,
And discord rose, the while upon the shore
Drifted the galley down the current fast.
And she who stood upon the prow had cast
Her angry words upon the storm in vain,
Though her deep tones came pealing down
the blast
As though the heavens should be rent in twain.
6.
And then I marked her, when she first espied
The fair child which had made this harm to be.
67 f 2
it
The Soul's There was great wonder mingled with her
Mutiny. pride,
That one so tenderly designed as he
Should dare dispute with her old mastery.
And yet nor anger nor proud looks might quell
The fearless eyes which smiled out mutiny,
Till her own heart seemed stricken with the
spell,
7-
With wonderment fast quickening to dismay,
And a dull rage which smouldered 'neath her
brows,
And then rage, wonder, pride did fade away
Before the cruel thought which lastly rose
From out her mad heart with colossal throes,
A thought so heavy 'black that I did guess
It came full'freighted with the immortal woes
Of an old god dethroned and heavenless.
8.
For, sudden, with a shout, her arms she threw
High o'er her head, a torch in either hand,
And round the ship the flames triumphant flew,
The shrivelling sails fell low, while still she
fanned
W^ith tempest voice the leaping fire which
spanned
The sinking galley with an arch of flame.
I heard her thunder forth her last command
And bid the traitors perish in their shame.
68
.* ' -. '■'■" " '
me.
9. The Soul's
The ship went down, and a sad cry arose, Mutiny.
Stifled with smoke and rushing waters in.
The silent stream, as heedless of men's woes,
^Xfent on its way as they had never been.
The brave ship rots upon the ooze, I ween,
And naked limbs lie stark upon the shore,
Long ripples lap that angryhearted queen,
And wash those mutinous eyes for evermore.
SONG. THINK NO MORE OF ME. Song. Think
I HINK no more of no morc of
me,
Ifweneedsmustpart
Mine was but aheart.
Think no more of me.
Think no more of me.
For love's sake forget,
Love grows hard
which cannot see,
It may wound us yet.
2.
Think no more of me,
Love has had his day,
Now love runs away.
Think no more of me.
Think no more of me.
If we loved or not
Hidden is 'twixt me and thee,
It were best forgot.
69 fa
Song. Think
no more of
me.
Think no more of me,
"We shall need our tears
For the coming years.
Think no more of me.
Think no more of me.
In the world above
Sadder far it were if we
Met and did not love.
Song.
Come with
the Summer
leaves. In
part from the
Italian.
SONG. COME WITH THE SUM,
MER LEAVES.
OME with the sum,
mer leaves, love, to
my grave,
And, if you doubt
among the quiet dead,
Choose out that
mound where
greenest grasses wave,
And where the
flowers blow thickest
and most red.
2.
Come in the morning while the dews of night,
Which are fair Nature's tears in darkness shed,
Rim the sad petals nor are garnered quite,
Like my lost hopes untimely harvested.
70
^3H
3- Song.
Come to my grave, ah, gather, love, those
flowers: the Summer
Out of my heart they grow for your dear head ; leaves.
These are its songs unwritten and all yours,
The love I loved you with and left unsaid.
THE EVICTION. TheEviction
ln.Tr.TTT it- c from words
NRULY tenant of b ^ q
my heart,
Full fain would
I be quit of
thee,
I've played too long
a losing part,
Thou bringest me
neither gold nor fee.
2.
'Tis time thou shouldst thy holding yield,
Thy will and mine no longer meet,
With cockle hast thou sowed my field,
With squanderings all the public street.
3<
Thy presence doth disturb my pride,
Let me be owner of my own,
I fling thee with thy goods outside,
And bar reentry with a stone.
71 f4
I
The Eviction
Begone and hide thee from my face,
I will not see thee chiding there;
Away, to live in my disgrace !
Away, to die in thy despair !
5-
O impotence of human wit!
The law is mine, the fault in thee,
And yet in vain I serve the writ,
In vain I scourge thee with decree.
For, lo, in stillness of the night,
O'erturning stone and guard and door,
Thou art come with thy lost tenant right
And hast possession as before.
Good-bye. GOOD-BYE.
JO O LS ! must we ever
quarrel with our fate ?
Too late
Reading the worth of
what we did despise,
And wise
At the journey's end
to weep it scarce begun
When done.
72
2. GoocUbye.
No more! 'Tfs ever the same story told
As of old.
Children, we used to wish our childhood past:
At last
It ended, as this journey ends, and we
Are free.
3-
Shall we lament? It were an idle tale
To wail.
Can we be wise ? Oh, wisdom comes too late,
And fate
Answers our wicked prayer for liberty:
"Good-bye."
WRITTEN AT SEA.
[AT is my quarrel
I with thee, beautiful
sea,
That thus I cannot
love thy waves or
Ithee,
jOr hear thy voice
jbut it tormenteth
jme?
Why do I hate thee, who art beautiful
Beyond all beauty, when the nights are cool,
And the stars fade because the moon is full ?
73
Written at
Sea,
. Ml
Written at o,
c
WTiy do I hate thee ? Thou art new and young,
And life is thine for loving, and thy tongue
Hath tones that I have known and loved and
sung.
4-
Thou hast a smile which would my smiling
greet;
Thy brave heart beateth as my own doth beat,
And thou hast tears which should be true and
sweet.
5-
Thou art a creature, strong and fair and brave,
Such as I might have given the world to have
And love and cherish : and thou art my slave.
. 6.
I have my home in thee. Thy arms enfold
Me all night long, and I am rocked and rolled,
And thou art never weary of thy hold.
7-
Thou art a woman in thy constancy,
And worthy better love than mine could be;
And yet, behold, I cannot suffer thee.
8.
If thou wert dumb : if thou wert like the sky,
Which has not learned to speak our misery
In any voice less rude than the wind's cry;
74
9. Written at
If thou wert wholly young and didst not know ^ ea -
The secret of our ancient human woe,
Or if thou knewest it wholly as I know;
10.
Or yet if thou wert old with all these years ;
If thou wert dull to hopes and loves and fears ;
If thou wert blind andcouldst not see our tears;
If.
If thou wert bounded by some rocky shore,
And hadst not given thyself thus wholly o'er
To our poor single selves with all thy store;
12.
If thou wert not in thy immensity,
A single circle circling with the sky,
Where we must still be centres changelessly ;
13-
If thou wert other than thou art; alas,
If thou wert not of water, but a mass
Of formless earth, a waveless plain of grass;
14.
If thou wert shapeless as the mountains are;
If thou wert clad in some discordant wear;
If thou wert not so blue and trim and fair;
15.
If thou wert decked with towns and villages;
If there were heard across the silent seas
The music of church bells upon the breeze;
75
Written at
Sea.
mi
16.
If thou wert this ; or if thou wert not near,
But I could only sit apart and hear
The beating of thy waves, and find it drear,
»7-
But wild and quite unknown, and far from me :
Sea, if thou couldst no longer be the sea,
Then I could love thee as thou lovest me.
18.
Ifthouwouldsthavemelovethee,beautifulsea,
Build up a wall of dark 'twixt thee and me :
Let me not see thee: call the night to thee.
19. "
League with the winds : rise up, and send them
driven
To roll mad clouds about thy back at even :
Make thee a desolation of the heaven.
20.
Thoushouldst compelmewith thyangry voice
To choose 'twixt death and thee, and, at the
choice,
If my cheek grew not pale, thou might'st rej oice,
21,
And I might love thee, oh, thou monstrous sea ;
But now I cannot love thy waves or thee,
Or bear thy beauty in my misery.
76
^Ai
■M
A DAY I N THE CASTLE OF ENVY A Day in
| H E castle walls are tnc Castle
full of eyes, of Envy,
And notamouse may
creep unseen,
All the window'slits
are spies,
And the towers stand
sentinel
High above the gar/-
dens green.
Not a lizard lurking close
In the brambles of the dell;
Not a beetle as he goes,
Toiling in the dust, may tell
The least secret of his woes
To the idle butterflies ;
Not a privet moth may flit
But the castle looketh wise,
But the old king knoweth it.
2.
All day long the garden gates
Open stand for who will in,
For the old king loveth well
The reek of human loves and hates.
Most of all he loveth sin,
All that sendeth souls to hell,
All that hath the earthy smell
Of a joy that soon shall die.
77
— - -^—^-■•^ — .
A Day in And he sitteth there and saith
the Castle " Every creature that hath breath
of Envy. Goeth with the taint of death."
There he waiteth overhead,
Spieth out what he may spy,
Like an evil'omened gled.
From the morning till the night
There is nothing which doth move,
There is nothing which can lie
Still and hidden out of sight,
But he seeth it above,
But he feeleth all the pleasure
Of its basking in the sun.
And his wisdom taketh measure
Of the sorrow which shall come
"When the summer days are done.
Life and love are quickly run.
So he watcheth silently,
Waiting till the end shall be.
4-
There he sitteth at the dawn
"When the world begins to rouse;
And the daisies on the lawn
Open wide their stainless eyes;
Then he feeleth as in pain
For the wrinkles on his brows.
He doth envy the sunrise,
78
That it maketh all things gay; A Day in
And his jealous ear hath heard the Castle
The first piping of a bird; of Envy.
And he curseth at the day,
But his curses are in vain,
For the world grows young again.
5-
From the shadow of the rocks,
Stealing out and stealing in,
Creeps the hungry foot^pad fox
On the wild fowls nestled close.
Then a weirdly smile and thin
Curleth on his lip and nose,
As the red beast winds the flocks.
And there is an evil mirth,
In the glitter of his eye,
For the sun hath warmed the earth,
And he seeth something stir
In the grass and then awake,
Turn and stretch her stealthily;
And he hisseth at the snake,
As the heat unfoldeth her.
63
There he bideth through the noon,
While the pine tops clash together,
Till deep silence, like a tune,
Wrappeth all the earth and air;
And the old king dreamily
Noddeth his great heron feather
79
A Day in As he sitteth in his chair,
the Castle For sleep cometh upon all,
of Envy. Rock and castle, flower and tree,
And the turrets wave and quiver;
And the battlemented wall
Bendeth in the haze of noon,
And the fhvcones one by one,
Split like thunder in the heat;
And the old king hearing it,
Saith, " It is the angry sun."
7-
But as noontide slowly wears
From the pastures underneath,
Solemn ravens cross in pairs,
Drop a hollow croak and pass,
WTiich the king, who listeneth,
Readeth for the name of Death ;
And he mocketh at the sound,
Croaketh back a croak as hoarse,
For he knoweth they are bound
To the dell where, on the grass,
There is that which was a corse.
8.
Suddenly a merry noise
In the garden makes him glad,
For he knoweth well what joys
Noise and merriment shall bring.
They are children come to tread
The young daisies on the head ;
80
And he loveth well their play, A Day in
For they take the butterflies the Castle
And they tear them wing from wing; of Envy.
And the old king looketh wise
At the footstep on the bed,
And the broken myrtle spray;
And he readeth all the lies
"Which their innocence shall tell.
"Well it pleaseth him such eyes
Should have learned the speech of hell.
?•
But at evening, lovers walk
Underneath the ilex trees,
And the king hath heard their talk,
And the vows which they have spoken,
And he knoweth too the tale
Of the vows which they have broken;
And the name and history,
And the secret which doth lie
Underneath their smiling pale;
And the hidden tale of sorrow
Of the maiden as she goes,
And the pleasures she doth borrow,
That her grief may learn to die.
And he laugheth at her woes
As his red eye reads the scrawl
Love once wrote upon the wall :
Love grown cold, whose tasting is
Like the memory of a kiss.
81 gi
>*-=-
A Day in to.
the Castle Thus he sitteth till the sun
or envy. Sendeth out long shadows slant,
Till the fish/tanks down beneath
Hidden lie in vapour dun;
And the castle rising gaunt
Slowly stretcheth out its limbs
Like a drowsyheaded Hun.
But when all is deep in shade,
And the broad sun on the sea
Lieth on his flaming bed,
Twisteth, writheth in agony,
Like a wizard fiery ^clad,
Tortured and about to die,
Then the old king goeth mad.
n.
And he curseth loud thereat:
Curseth at the setting sun;
Curseth at the coming night;
Curseth at the flitting bat,
And the stars which cannot see;
Curseth at the pale moonrise,
And her solemn mockery
Of a daylight which is done;
Thinketh, though he should curse the skies
Every hour till night is gone,
Naught his curses may devise
For the pale moon's sorceries,
82
^
Or the darkness which shall be.
This the thought which tortureth him,
That, for all he watcheth close,
Though his eyes be bright alway,
And for all that he is king:
All the knowledge of all he knows
Telleth not what night may bring,
Telleth not what steps may stray.
A Day in
the Castle
of Envy.
12.
Then he sendeth forth a scout,
Biddeth shut the garden gate;
And there is a sudden rout
Of the children and the lovers
^W horn the warder's eye discovers
In the twilight lurking late :
Lovers who are loath to part;
But their prayers avail them not,
And the maiden's witching pout
Cannot melt the warder's heart;
Straightway he hath turned them out.
For along the castle wall
Go the archers stout and tall ;
And the king, who sitteth still
In the darkness of the tower,
Waiteth till the seneschal,
Wrth his stalwart serving^men,
Bear him out against his will
In his chair, while curses shower.
8 3
g
i
A Day in 13.
"l e Jr e To the banquet he is borne,
of Envy. While the cracked be n to H etn s \ OWf
And the king doth beat his breast
Slowly to that chime forlorn;
Beateth on his beard of snow,
First in anger then in jest,
First in mirth and then in scorn;
Singeth low, ■ * Ring bravely, bell,
" For thy voice is loud and dry;
" Such a tongue as thine is good
"To out-talk the chimes ofhell.
" Laugh we bravely, thou and I ;
"While the world is in laughing mood.
"We may live to laugh its knell."
A Ballad of A BALLAD QFTHE HEATHER.
* E spent a day to,
getner,
One day of all our
lives,
Of love in cloudless
weather:
Such only youth
contrives :
One day in the red
heather,
Alone with our two lives.
84
^
2. A Ballad of
The tall grey rocks were near us, the heather.
The birch trees lent us shade,
The moor/-fowl did not fear us,
Nor was the fox afraid;
No other life was near us
Of matron, man, or maid.
3«
The glory of the morning
Had made our pulses beat,
The dangers we were scorning,
The pleadings of retreat,
Her mother's eyes of warning,
The foes that we might meet.
4-
Earth's silence was our token,
The sunlight on the hill;
She spoke of things unspoken,
We stopped and gazed our fill;
The stillness was not broken,
Save thus at our own will.
5-
We sat down by the water,
A green and quiet place,
She ate what I had brought her
When she had said her grace;
She was Eve's fairest daughter,
I kneeled and kissed her face.
85 g3
nam
A Ballad of 6.
the heather. O, love, what deeds thou darest
WTien truth is on thy lips !
W^hat royal robes thou wearest!
Wliat wealth is in thy ships !
What glories thou declarest
With thy mad finger-tips !
7-
We called on the high heaven
In witness of our troth,
From morning until even,
WTiile time was little loath
To give and be forgiven
The dear love in us both.
8.
Aloft the raven scouting
Gave warning to the glen;
We heard a sound of shouting,
The tramp of angry men;
No time was there for doubting,
And I was one to ten.
9-
I hid her in the braken,
A brood'bird on its nest;
She wept as one forsaken
And held me to her breast;
We dared not thus be taken.
I fled, for it was best.
86
lo.
They passed her by unheeded ;
They hunted me in sight;
I lured them while she needed,
A lapwing feigning flight;
Then o'er the hills I speeded
And left them to the night.
A Ballad of
the heather.
tt.
Alas, dear love, together
No more in all our lives
Shall we in cloudless weather,
Outwitting maids and wives,
Take joy of the red heather
And love and our two lives.
ON THE WAY TO CHURCH.
JH E RE is one I know.
I see her sometimes
pass
In the morning streets
upon her way to mass:
A calm sweet woman
with unearthly eyes.
Men turn to look at
her, but ever stop,
' Reading in those blue
depths the death of hope
And a wise chastisement for thoughts unwise.
87 g4
On the way
to Church.
S^SSHBBi
On the way 2.
to Church. Pure is her brow as of a marble Saint,
Her brown hair pencils it with ripples faint.
There is no shadow on it and no light.
Her cheeks are pale like lilies in eclipse.
Hardly a little redness on her lips
Paints the sad smile where all the rest is white.
. 3 *
Tall is she and bent forward like a reed
Which the wind toys with as she walks with
speed:
GirMike her limbs and virginal her waist.
Of the world's wonders there is none so sweet
As this, the summer lightning of her feet,
Speeding her onward like a fawn in haste.
■!•
What is her secret? All the world has tried
To guess it. One I knew in guessing died
And was no wiser for his mortal pain.
Each has turned sadder from the thankless
quest,
And gone back silent, even if he guessed,
Knowing all answer would be counted vain.
I knew her once. I know her not to-day.
Our eyes meet sometimes, but hers turn away
Quicker from mine than from the rest that look.
Her pale cheek quivers, a flush comes and goes,
As in the presence of a soul that knows,
And her hands tighten on her missal book.
88
Men have done evil yet have won to Heaven,
Lived in blood'guiltiness yet died forgiven.
May I not, I too, one day win my grace ?
Ah, no ! The sacrilege or this worst sin
Outweighs all grace. I dare not enter in
Nor kneel, God's robber, near that angel face.
On the way
to Church.
GIACINTA.
Giacinta.
IACINTA sat upon
the garden wall
Among the autumn
lilies, and let fall
Their crimson petals
on her lover's head,
And laughed because
her little hands were
red.
She was the fairest
child of Italy,
And it was well the lilies thus should die.
BUT Giulio shuddered when she made him
kiss
The stains away in her pride's wantonness,
And held them up between him and the sun
That he might see the red blood flame and run
In the long finger'clefts from root to tip,
And still she pressed them closer to his lip,
89
-^
Giacinta. And still shelaughed. But Giulio looked at her,
And it was half in love and half in fear.
AND, when she saw him tremble, childishly
She laid both hands in his, and with a sigh
Told him to pity them. And he in vain
Hid them in his and would have hid his pain,
And tried to speak but could not for the weight
Upon his breast. And so the lovers sat
In a hard silence, while Giacinta' s laugh
Rang in his ears like the discordant half
Of some fair carol from a tavern flung,
She watching him above, the flowers among,
First with her smile and then with a hurt pride
Kindling to wrath. And " fool," at last she cried,
"You think, because this hand of mine is white
" And smooth to touch and wise in love's dc
light,
" It had not dared to dabble in such red,
"The blood, of these dead flowers, for dead is
dead.
" And you sit dumb and tremble and turn pale
" Because I laugh to see the lilies fall,
"Why not laugh with me, since you have the
heart
" To say you love me in my tragic part ?
" Think you that blood can make a hand less
white,
" Or all the ink of heaven blot out to-night
" The innocent stars, or kisses steal away
"The sweetness of red lips, or memory
90
" Drive laughter from the world ? The moon Giacinta.
grows wan
"And wastes and fades and shrivels to a span,
"Yet men watch on beyond the hills at even,
*' And lo there is a new moon in the heaven !
" Look in my eyes: Are they less pure or keen
" For all the passion which their depths have
seen?
" Is there a stain upon my brows ? My cheek,
" Is it less fair for what it dares not speak ?
" Oh, Simon's blood was not so red a thing
" But it has left my face its colouring.
" Or think you, drops from any vein of his
"Could make my fingers blush as deep as this?"
AND Giulio' s courage sickened when he heard
Giacinta suddenly speak out this word.
She was the fairest child of Italy,
But Giulio thought it had been well to die.
"YET,haditleftmepale," she said," I know
" It had been all as one to Giulio
"To love a pale face. You will love me yet
"Though I have told you how my hands are
wet,
" And when I hold them out to you to kiss
"Your lips will burn to drink away the lees.
"Oh, lovers, lovers! Wherefore will you preach
""When women laugh at whatyou dare to teach
" Of truth and honour ? Is there one of you,
9}
Giacinta, " One honourable friend, one bosom true,
" That will not sell his virtue for a kiss,
"Though the mouth that gave it were a nest of
lies,
"And will not sooth his soul with the deceit
" Wliich swears a rose is not a whit less sweet
" Because an angry bee was in its cell
" An hour ago ? Oh, lovers reason well :
" So take the flower and deign forget the bee.
" But, Giulio, do not bid me stop and see
" How beautiful a thing your virtue is,
"And do not cry to the unheeding skies,
"'Did I not love her?' See, I hate your love
" More than I hate yourself."
AND Giulio strove
With his weak heart and could not bear the
pain,
And so he took Giacinta's hand again,
Without more word. But she in softened mood
Looked at the boy her beauty had subdued,
And said " Poor Giulio. I have never shewn
" Much hate to you, and this you needs must
own.
" Only beware of loving me.'Tis strange
"That men are wise, yet cannot take the range
" Of a silly woman's mind, but still devise
" Of their fool's love, as if it were the prize
" For which a woman might forget the cost
" Of her undoing and a world well lost,
92
" And cannot see that love is only this,
" A pretty word to whisper in a kiss,
"As when one says, 'God bless you' with
' Good/night.'
" But Giulio, who would ever suffer it
"A man should always have the name of God
"Upon his lips ?"
HER lover only trod
The lilies with his heel. At last he sighed,
" And Simon loved you, and for this he died ? "
THEY sat till dusk upon the garden wall,
And she began to sing a madrigal
About the fallingleaves, and quite forgot
To answer him. But Giulio heeded not
Because he held her hand. He could not flee.
She was the fairest child of Italy.
Giacinta.
THE WANDERER'S RETURN. The Wander,
IN old heart's mourn. er ' s RctUm *
ing is ahideous thing,
And weeds upon an
aged weeper cling
Like night upon a
grave. The city there,
Gaunt as a woman
who has once been fair,
Lay black with win.
ter, and the silent rain
93
The Wanders Fell thro' the heavens darkly, like a stain
er's Return. Upon her face. The dusky houses rose,
Unlovely shapes laid naked on the ooze,
Grimed with long sooty tears. The night fell
down
And gathered all the highways in its frown :
This was my home.
I SAWmen pass and pass
Nor stop to look into a neighbour's face;
I dared not look in theirs because my eyes
Were faint and travel^' arred and would not
rise
From the dull earth, and hunger made them
dim,
The hunger of a seven years' angry dream
Of love and peace and home unsatisfied;
And now my heart, thus grievously denied,
Rose, like a caged bird in the nesting time,
Wlio beats against the bars that prison him,
In all its greenness of youth's wounds and pain,
And would not cease till these should bleed
again.
FOR I had gone a hunter through the
world,
And set my tent in every land and hurled
My spears at life because my joys were dead,
And many a fair field of the Earth was red
Where I had passed, and many a wind might
tell
94
Of stricken souls which to my arrows fell. The Wander-
I would not stop to listen to their cries, er's Return.
But went my way and thought that I was wise.
A WANDERER'S life, whether his lone
chase be man
Or only those poor outlaws under ban,
The creatures of the field his hand destroys
Through rage of wantonness or need of noise,
Is the fierce solace of its anger given
To a hurt soul which dares not turn to heaven.
Wrth me it was a vengeance of love lost,
A refuge proved for passions tempest-tossed,
An unguent for despairs that could not kill.
I wandered in the desert and the hill,
Seeking dry places, and behold my grief
Fled from my footprints and I found relief;
And it had happened to me, as befalls
Men bred in cities who have left their walls
For gain or pleasure, that the wilderness
Grew lastly wearisome: I loved it less.
AND once a desperate chase had led me on
To an unknown land when daylight was near
done,
And I sat weary by my slaughtered prey
And watched the cranes which northward fled
away
Rank upon rank into the depths of air,
And still the horizon, lifeless, vast and bare,
95
•__
— ^
The Wander^ Stretched wide around, and like a vaultof dread
er's Return. The arch of heaven hemmed me overhead,
And the great eye of the dead beast was set
Upon my own. I felt my cheek was wet:
Oh, surely then, for all man's heart be hard,
Though he have taken Nature by the beard,
And lived alone as to the manner born;
And though his limbs be strung with toil, and
worn
To all Earth's dangers, yet at such a time
His coward soul will overmaster him,
Saying/' Beware, thou child of Earth, even now
". Look at the world, how wide it is", and thou
" How small ! And thou hast dared to be alone !"
And, lo, the last long flight of cranes was gone,
And darkness with its folding pity crept
Over the plain. I hid my face and wept,
Till sleep fell on me. But when dawn was come
I turned my steps to what had been my home.
THE Palace gardens ! I had fled aside
From the gaunt streets in easement of my pride
After the lamps were lit, for to my brain
The tumult and the passers by were pain :
The gardens where, in those far summertimes,
A boy I came to watch the pantomimes
Among a laughing crowd of white^capped
bonnes
And red'cheeked children and loud country
clowns,
96
-
Or where along the wall in graver sense, TheWander'
And screened from winds in their "petite er's Return.
Provence/'
"With the first chestnut'blossoms old men sat
And cheered their melancholy souls with chat,
Thawing like frozen apples in the sun !
The old men and the children all were gone.
The leaves, their canopy, lay torn and dead,
And crushed in spongy neaps beneath my tread,
The fountains recreant to their laughter lay
Murk pools of silence shrouded from the day,
As though no doves had ever at their brink
Stooped in full June to plume themselves and
drink;
Only the trees stood, witness of the past;
Sad trees, I greeted them. I held them fast
Like a friend's hands. They were as changed
and bare
As my own life, but calm in the despair
Of their long winter's martyrdom, and I
A very child in my philosophy !
Till I remembered that no spring would come
To mock the winter of my own long doom
With any merriment. And "Trees," I cried,
"Your hearts within are all too greenly dyed
"To match with mine." I let their branches go,
And sat upon a bench to feed my woe
With memories long hidden out of mind,
But which trooped back that night and rode
the wind.
97 hl
The Wander' THESE wooden benches, what sad ghosts of
er's Return, pleasures
Had used them nightly crouching o'er their
treasures,
My own long murdered joys, since there we sat
Blind in our love and insolent to Fate !
Each one a witness proved of our lost vows,
Our prayers, our protests, all our souls' carouse :
Each one inscribedthrough the unheedingyears
With letters of a name I wrote in tears.
'TWAS here I saw her first, a pure sweet
woman,
Fair as a goddess, but with smile all human,
Her children at her knees, who went and came
At each new wayward impulse of their game,
And she reproving, with her quiet eyes
Veiling the mirth they could not all disguise.
The echo of her voice with its mute thrill
Lived in these glades and stirred my pulses still,
Though I had lived to hear it in what tone
Of passionate grief and soul's disunion.
She stood, a broken lily, by that tree,
Sunlight and shade for ever changingly
Chequering the robe she wore of virgin white,
When first I touched the goal of my delight,
Her woman's hand, and hid it in my hands.
Here shone the glory of her countenance,
Nobler for tears, when weakness for a space
Held full dominion in that heaven, her face,
98
And she confessed herself of grief divine, The Wander-'
And love grown young, a vintage of new wine, cr s Return?
And I was crowned her king. O silent trees,
You heard it and you know how to the lees
We drained the cup of life and found it good,
Gathering love's manna for our daily food
In scorn of the vain rest. You heard and knew
WTiat the world only guessed where all was
true.
And have you dreamed on in your quiet grove,
WTiile seven years were built against our love !
'TWAS on this bench I sat that day of June
Thinking of death a whole sweet afternoon,
Till I was sick of sorrow and my tongue
Weary of its long silence (I was young,
And thebirds sang so loud) and when thenight
Came, as it now came, and the lamps grew
bright
In the long street, lit like a diamond chain,
I rose and said, " I will not bear the pain.
"What is my pride worth that for it this smart
**. Should harrow up the green things of my heart
" For twelve importunate hours in such a sort?
'And pleasure is so sweet and life so short."
And as a martyr who long time has lain
Frozen in a dungeon, sees amid his pain,
When he has fasted on for many days,
Bright visions of hot feasts and hearths ablaze
With welcome, and who sells his gloomy creed,
99 h 2
TheWandeiv And is overcome of pleasure, so my need
Return. Conquered my pride, and I arose and went
Striding, with smiles at my new found intent,
Down these same gravel alleys to the gate,
And so beyond, like one inebriate,
Thinking the while of the fair baths and food
Set for the renegade, until I stood
Once more before her door I had forsworn;
I did not stop to question thoughts forlorn,
But knocked as I had knocked a thousand times ;
St. Roch's was ringing its last evening chimes,
And I still thought about the martyr's dream;
I saw the light within the threshold gleam,
"Which opened to me, and the voice I knew
Said, in all sweetness, as the door swung to,
**■ Come, we are just in time. How fortunate
"You, too, like me, have happened to be late."
I swear I said no word of the sad plans
I had plotted on this bench of ignorance:
There have been kings called happy, but not
one
As I that night. Ah, God ! to be alone,
Alone, and never more to hear her voice
Calling me back, blest martyr, to my joys !
I SAT there grieving in the cold and rain
Until my heart had half forgot its pain,
And when I rose I scarce could guide my feet,
They were so numb, to the unlovely street.
And yet need was my steps should bear me on
too
To some mad corner of that Babylon : The Wander>
And I must feed the gnawings or my soul er's Return.
Wrth broken meat. " The seven years may
roll/'
I said, "and men may change and she be dead.
Yet the house stands, God knows how
tenanted."
[ LE AN E D my back against the colonnade
Which skirts the square. I think I had not
prayed
Through all those years, but now I said a
prayer,
And hope in spite of reason seemed to wear
Green buds upon its branches. Who shall
know
If 'twas a vision sent me in my woe
To prove the power of prayer ? But, when I
turned
And looked across the square, the candles
burned
In the old upper windows, and before
A shadow crossed the curtain, and the door
Opened towards me and a voice there cried,
"Come. You are just in time." I put out wide
My arms into the darkness, and I fell.
WH E N I awoke 'twas as one passed from
hell,
Who fears and feels no longer. I was tired.
Joi h 3
TheWandeiv I scarcely cared to know when I inquired
er's Return. After the house. The girl who held the glass
To my lips (a flower-'girl it seemed she was)
Told me that house and square alike were gone,
Swept by new boulevards to oblivion :
Wliy should I grieve ? The new was worth the
old.
I listened to the story as 'twas told,
And lingered with her all the evening there,
Because she pitied me and she was fair,
And held me with her hand upon the latch.
"Sevenyears,"Isaid,"Itisalongnight'swatch,
" For any soul alone upon life's way,
" And mine is weary at the break of day."
END OF THE LOVE,LYRICS AND
SONGS OF PROTEUS.
102
THE LOVE, SONNETS
OFPROTEUS.
I.
DEDICATION.TO ONE IN A HIGH
POSITION.
O you, a poet, glorious,
heavervborn,
One who is not a poet
but a son
Of the earth earthy,
sick and travel^worn
And weary with a race
already run,
A battle lost ere yet
his day is done,
Comes with this tribute, shattered banners torn
From a defeat. You reign in Macedon,
My Alexander, as at earlier morn
You reigned upon Parnassus, hero, king.
I reign no more, not even in those hearts
For which these songs were made, and if I sing
'Tis with a harsh and melancholy note
At which my own heart like an echo starts.
Yet sometimes I can deem you listening,
And then all else is instantly forgot.
L
' : ^*msm
PARTI. MANON.
II.
TO MANON,COMPARING HER
TO A FALCON.
RAVE as a falcon
and as merciless,
Wrth bright eyes
watching still the
world, thy prey,
Isawtheepassin
thy lone majesty,
Untamed, un<-
mated, high above
the press.
The dull crowd gazed at thee. It could
not guess
The secret of thy proud aerial way,
Or read in thy mute face the soul which lay
j§ A prisoner there in chains of tenderness.
Lo, thou art captured. In my hand to-day
I hold thee, and awhile thou deignest to be
Pleased withmyjesses. I would fain beguile
My foolish heart to think thou lovest
me. See,
I dare not love thee quite. A little while
And thou shalt sail back heavenwards.
Woe is me!
III.
TO MANON. ON HIS FORTUNE
IN LOVING HER.
DID not choose thee,
dearest. It was Love
That made the choice,
not I. Mine eyes were
blind
As a rude shepherd's
who to somelone grove
His offering brings
and cares not at what
shrine
He bends his knee. The gifts alone were mine;
The rest was Love's, He took me by the hand,
And fired the sacrifice, and poured the wine,
And spoke the words I might not understand.
I was unwise in all but the clear chance
Which was my fortune, and the blind desire
WTiich led my foolish steps to love's abode,
And youth's sublime unreasoned prescience
Which raised an altar and inscribed in fire
Its dedication "to the unknown god."
106
=Ki*~
IV.
TO MANON. IN PRAISE OF HIS
FATE.
HEN I hear others
speak of this and that
In our fools' lives
which might have
better gone,
Complaining idly of
too niggard fate
And wishing still
their senseless past
undone,
I feel a childish tremor through me run,
Stronger than reason, lest by some far chance
Fate's ear to our sad plaints should yet be won
And these our lives be thrown back on our
hands.
I tremble when I think of my past years,
My hopes, my aims, my wishes. All these days
I might have wandered far from love and thee.
But kind fate held me, heedless of my prayers,
A prisoner to its wise mysterious ways,
And forced me to thy feet, .ah, fortunate me !
107
V.
TO MANON. ON THE POWER OF
HER BEAUTY.
AM lighthearted
now. An hour ago
There was a tempest
in my heaven, a flame
Of sullen lightning
under a bent brow
And a dull muttering
which breathed no
na me.
Now all is changed.
The very winds are tame,
And the birds sing aloud from every bough,
And my heart leaps. What empire dost thou
claim,
Child, o'er this earth, that nature serves thee
so?
Sublime magician ! Well may earth and heaven
Change at thy bidding, and the hearts of men.
Didst thou but know the power that beauty
hath,
The sea should leave his bed, the rocks be riven,
And wise men, deeming chaos come again,
Should kneel before thee and conjure thy
wrath.
108
VI.
TO MANON. DEPRECIATING
HER BEAUTY.
1 LOVE not thy petv
i fections. When I
hear
J Thy beauty blazoned,
and the common
tongue
Cheapening with
vulgar praise a lip,
an ear,
A cheek that I have
prayed to ; when among
The loud world's gods my god is noised and
sung,
Her wit applauded, even her taste, her dress,
Her each dear hidden marvel lightly flung
At the world's feetand stripped to nakedness :
Then I despise thy beauty utterly,
Crying, " Be these your gods, O Israel ! "
And I remember that on such a day
I found thee with eyes bleared and cheeks all
pale,
And lips that trembled to a voiceless cry,
And that thy bosom in my bosom lay.
109
.
VII.
TO MANON. ON HER VANITY.
| HAT are these things
thou lovest ? Vanity.
To see men turn their
heads when thou dost
pass;
To be the signboard
and the looking-glass
Where every idler
there may glut his
eye;
To hear men speak thy name mysteriously,
Wagging their heads. Is it for this, alas,
That thou hast made a placard of a face
On which the tears of love were hardly dry ?
What are these things thou lovest? The
applause
Of prostitutes at wit which is not thine;
The sympathy of shop/boys who would weep
Their shilling s^worth of woe in any cause,
At any tragedy. Their tears and mine,
What difference ? Oh, truly tears are cheap !
no
VIII.
TO MANON. AS TO HIS CHOICE
OF HER.
F I had chosen thee,
thou shouldst have
been
A virgin proud, mv
tamed, immaculate,
Chaste as the morn*'
ing star, a saint, a
queen,
Scarred by no wars,
no violence of hate.
Thou shouldsthavebeen of soul commensurate
With thy fair body, brave and virtuous
And kind and just; and, if of poor estate,
At least an honest woman for my house.
I would have had thee come of honoured blood
And honourable nurture. Thou shouldst bear
Sons to my pride and daughters to my heart,
And men should hold thee happy, wise, and
good.
Lo, thou art none of this, but only fair,
Yet must I love thee, dear, and as thou art.
m
IX.
TO MANON.ON HERWAYWARD,
NESS.
]HIS is rank slavery.
It better were
To till the' thankless
earth with sweat of
brow,
Following dull oxen
'neath a goad of care
To a boor's grave
agape behind the
plough.
It better were to linger in some slow
Unnatural case, the sport of flood or fire,
To be undone by some inhuman vow
And robbed in youth of youth and its desire.
It better were to perish than thus live
Thy pensioner and bondsman, day by day
Doing fool's service thus for love of thee.
How shall I save thee if thou wilt not grieve
Even for shames like these ? How shall I slay
The foes thou lovest, thou, their enemy?
112
X.
TO MANON. ON HER FORGIVE,
NESS OF A WRONG.
HIS is not virtue. To
forgive were great
If love were in the
issue and not gold.
But wrongs there are
'tis treason to forget,
And to forgive before
the deed was cold
Was a strange jest.
Ah, Manon, you
have sold
The keys of heaven at a vulgar rate,
A sum of money for the wealth untold
Of a just anger and the right to hate.
Well. It is done and the price paid. Now make
Haste to betray them as you me betrayed.
These are no longer foes to be forgiven.
Remember they are friends, that peace is made,
That you are theirs. Then rend them for love's
sake,
And let your hatred with your love be even.
"3
1 i
XI.
TO MANON. ON HER LIGHT.
HEARTEDNESS.
WOULD I had thy
courage, dear, to face
This bankruptcy of
love, arid greet despair
Wrth smiling eyes
and unconcerned em/
brace,
And these few words
ofbanterat"dull
care."
I would that I could sing and comb my hair
Like thee the morning thro', and choose my
dress,
And gravely argue -what I best should wear,
A shade of ribbon or a fold of lace.
I would I had thy courage and thy peace,
Peace passing understanding; that mine eyes
Could find forgetfulness like thine in sleep;
That all the past for me like thee could cease
And leave me cheerfully, sublimely wise,
Like David with washed face who ceased to
weep.
"4
XII.
ON READING CERTAIN LET,
TERS.
READING these lines,
1 this record of lost days
! "Where I am not, and yet
where love has been,
J This tale of passions
consecrate to men
Other than me, un/
witting of my ways,
I seem to hear some pa,
gan chaunt of praise
Hymned to an idol shrine in gardens green,
Some wild soft worship of a god obscene,
Some idle homage to an idol's face.
I shut my ears, yet hear it still. My eyes
See not, yet see the unchaste, the unlawful fire.
I scent the odour of the sacrifice,
And feel the victim's shriek. Then in my ire
I rise up, as on Horeb, and I cry,
" There is none other god, but only I."
115
1 2
=5WWE
XIIL
HE DARES NOT DIE.
OUR hours by the
clock ! How strange it
is ! Four hours,
Since love and life, the
future and the past,
Died with the shutting
of these silent doors,
And thought became
to me one purpose vast.
I have not moved from
where she sat. The cast
Of her fingers on this cushion lightly scores
Its surface still; and still I hear the last
Tones of her laughter, and here lie her flowers.
Poor flowers ! The ugliness of grief has wrought
Your change already. No besotted bloom
Of a false dawn has lured you to base life.
You at the pinch were brave and trifled not,
Going ungrudging to our common doom,
And I ? Ah, God ! I have not faced the knife !
116
wm
«k
XIV.
HE HAS FALLEN FROM THE
HEIGHT OF HIS LOVE.
OVE, how ignobly
hast thou met thy doom !
Unseasoned scaffolding
by which, full'fraught
"With passionate youth
and mighty hopes, we
clomb
To our heart's heaven,
fearing, doubting,
naught !
Oh, Love, thou wert too frail for such mad sport,
Too rotten at thy core, designed too high :
And we who trusted thee our death have bought,
And bleeding on the ground must surely die.
I will not see her. WTiat she now may be
I care not. For the dream within my brain
Is fairer, nobler, and more kind than she,
And with that vision I can mock at pain.
God ! Was there ever woman half so sweet,
Or death so bitter, or at such dear feet ?
«7
» 3
t .
XV.
TO HIS FRIEND, COMPLAINING
THAT HE HAD FALLEN AMONG
THIEVES.
H, L. . ., I have
gambled with my soul,
And, like a spendthrift,
pawned my heritage
To pitiless Jews, and
paid a monstrous toll
To knaves and usurers :
and all to wage
Fair war with black/-
legs, men who dared
to gauge
My youth's bright honour as an antique thing,
A broadsword to their fencing point and edge.
So the game went. And even yet I cling
To my mad humour, reckoning up each stake,
Each fair coin lost. O miserable slaves,
Who for the sake of gold, the poorest thing
Man ever won from the earth's bosom, take
To rope or poison, and who labour not
Even to "dig dishonourable graves,"
See one who has lost a pound for every groat,
For every penny of your squandering!
«8
XVI.
HE ARGUES WITH HIS LIFE.
Y life, what strange
mad garments hast
thou on,
Now that I see thee
truly and am wise,
Thou wild, lost Pro/
teus, strangling and
undone!
W^hat shapes are these,
what metamorphoses
Of a god's soul in pain ? I hear thy cries
And see thee writhe and take fantastic forms,
And strike in blindness at the destinies
And at thyself, and at thy brother worms.
Ah, foolish worm, thou canst not change thy
lot,
And all like thee must perish 'neath the sun.
Why struggle with thy fellows ? Nay, be kind,
Kinder than these. Behold, the flower-pot
Of fate is emptied out, and one by one
The fisher takes you, and his hooks are blind.
no
*4
_»
SS
XVII.
JOY'S TREACHERY.
HAD a live joy once
and pampered her,
For I had brought her
from the " golden
East/'
To lie when nights
were cold upon my
breast
And sit beside me the
long days and purr,
Until her whole soul should be lapped in fur,
Deep as her claws ; a beautiful sleek beast,
WTiich I might love. But, when I deemed it
least,
Her topaz eyes were on my stomacher,
Athirst for blood. Thus, for I loathed her since
I learned her guile, one night I had her slain
And thrown upon a dunghill to the flies,
Who bred in her fair limbs a pestilence,
"Whereof I sickened. Thus it ever is:
Dead joys unburied breed us death and pain.
120
_^mB
XVIII.
HE LAMENTS THAT HIS LOVE IS
DEAD.
Y love is dead, dead
and in spite of me, . .
Dead while I lived, . .
while yet my blood
was rife
With hope and
pleasure and the
fride of life,
'or my love ended
unexpectedly
During the winter, stricken like a tree
By a night's cold, and frozen to the blood,
"Whose leaves fell offand never were renewed
By any promise of the years to be.
And, when the spring came, and the birds,
to mate
Among its branches, lo ! they found it bare,
Though all around was summer in the wood.
Yet they took heart awhile, incredulous
That such a tree should be for ever dead.
"'Tis early yet," they cried "The spring is late.
It shall still be as in the days that were."
But summer came and went while the tree
stood
Bare in the sun, like a deserted house.
Then the birds suddenly despaired and fled.
121
.
XIX.
HE PROTESTS, NOTWITHSTAND.
ING, HIS LOVE.
O be cast forth from
the fair light of heaven
Into the outer darkness
and there lie,
Through unrecorded
years of agony,
Unseen, unheard, un/
pitied, unforgiven;
To be forgotten of the
earth and sky,
Forgotten of the womb that once did bear,
The eyes that cheered, the voice that comforted,
The very breast where love had laid his head;
To be alone with darkness and despair,
Alone with endless death and not to die;
All these be punishments within the hand
Of an avenging deity to deal.
To these I bow in weakness as behoves.
Yet not in anger but in love I stand
'Gainst heaven, a new Prometheus, and appeal
From God to my own soul which ceaseless loves.
His be the wrath, the burning and the rod.
Hell shall not make me traitor to my God.
122
XX.
ON FALLING ILL THROUGH
GRIEF.
RUCE to thee, Soul,
I have a debt to pay,
WTiich I acknowledge
and without thy
pleading.
I like thee little that
thou barrest my way
Wrth prayers too late
for one well past thy
heeding.
Truce to these tears ! Thy fellow lieth bleeding,
Wounded by thee; and thou, forsooth, dost
say,
" I have a servant who is sick and needing
Care at men's hands." The care was thine to
hen this same Soul was sick, a while ago,
The Body watched her, till his eyes grew dim
And his cheeks pale for very sympathy,
Because she grieved. His love hath wrought
him woe,
For he is sick and she despiseth him.
Poor Body, I must take some thought of thee.
»23
_•
XXI.
HIS BONDAGE TO MANON IS
BROKEN.
"{ROM this day forth I
lead another life.
Another life! A life
without a tear !
To-day has ended the
unequal strife,
My service and my
sorrow finish here.
See, my soul cuts her
cable of belief,
And sails towards the Ocean. She shall steer
Sublime henceforth o'er accidents of grief.
Her storm has rolled to a new Hemisphere.
I have loved too much, too loyally, too long.
To-'day I am a pirate of the Sea.
Let others suffer. I have suffered wrong.
Let others love, and love as tenderly.
Oh, Manon, there are women yet unborn
Shall rue thy frailty, else am I forsworn.
124
H
PART II.
JULIET.
1
XXIi.
TO JULIET. ON THE NATURE OF
LOVE.
OU ask my love.WTiat
shall my love then be ?
A hope, an aspiration,
a desire?
The soul's eternal
charter writ in fire
Upon the earth, the
heavens, and the sea ?
You ask my love. The
carnal mystery
Of a soft hand, of finger/tips that press,
Of eyes that kindle and of lips that kiss,
Of sweet things known to thee and only thee ?
You ask mylove.Wliat love canbe more sweet
Than hope or pleasure ? Yet we love in vain.
The soul is more than joy, the life than meat.
The sweetest love of all were love in pain,
And that I will not give. So let it be.
Nay, give me any love, so it be love of thee.
127
XXIII.
TO JULIET, ASKING FOR HER
HEART.
l;
jIVE me thy heart,
Juliet, give me thy
heart!
I have a need of it, an
absolute need,
Because my own
heart has thus long
been dead.
I live but by thy life.
The very smart
Of this new pain which has been born of thee
Is thine, thy own great pleasure's counterpart.
I stand before thee naked. Clothe thou me.
Bring out a robe, . . thy truth, thy chastity.
Put rings upon my fingers, . . honour's meed.
For thou canst give, nor ever reck the cost,
Being the royal creature that thou art,
The fountain of all honour, whose high boast
Is to be greatest when thou givest most.
128
mammammmmmmammmaemaaamsBBKaBegsm
XXIV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
2.
21 VE me thy soul, Juliet, give me
J thy soul !
I am a bitter sea,which drinketh in
I The sweetness of all waters, and
so thine.
' Thou, like a river, pure and swift
and full
And freighted with the wealth of many lands,
With hopes and fears and death and life, dost
roll
Against the troubled ocean of my sin.
Thou doubtest not, though on these desert
sands
The billows surge against thee black with brine,
Unwearied. For thy love is fixed and even
And bears thee onward, and thy faith is whole.
Though thou thyself shouldst sin, yet surely
heaven
Hath held thee guiltless and thou art forgiven.
129 ki
--■
XXV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
J IVE me thy kiss,Juliet, give me
thy kiss.
I with my body worship thee and
vow
Such service to thy needs as man
1 can do.
I ask no nobler servitude than this.
Am I not thine, the bondsman of thy love,
Whom thou hast bought and ransomed at a
price,
And therefore worthy to be ranked above
The very stars that in the heavens move?
And, Juliet, since I thus am one with you,
And kinglier than Plantagenet or Guelph,
"What price were meet for my high mightiness ?
"What gold of joy, what hope, what heavenly
pelf
Hast thou to give ? Nay, sweetest, give thyself.
130
XXVI.
THE SAME
(Continued) .
4-
INCE thouhast given methese,
Juliet, given me these,
There nave been tidings told of
a great joy,
Of peace on Earth, good-will
=5rre» without annoy.
Thou hast put on my soul's infirmities
And stooped to succour me; and thouhast trod
The way of sorrows with me, on thy knees,
Making thyself a little less than god,
That I might worship him in womanhood,
A new redemption. Therefore, Juliet,
The choirs of heaven multitudinous
Make all their songs to thee this happy night,
In praise of thy great love incarnate thus,
A very "word made flesh "to dwell with us.
131
k2
XXVII.
TO JULIET, ASKING THE FULFIL.
MENT OF HER LOVE.
ASK for love who
famished am in plenty,
Not scorning the dear
manna of your tears
But being vexed with
that too froward
twenty
WTiich heads the sum
of my rebellious years.
My soul is fallen " in
lust of cucumbers,
Offish, of melons," through its longabstaining.
Unworthy Egypt yet enslaves my fears.
Ah, love, I thirst, but not for heaven's raining.
Wliy speak to me, alas, of heavenly joys
"Who ask for joys of earth these cannot cheat?
WTiatare these clouds, thesepillars of fire to me?
The wilderness is long. Youth cannot be
For ever fed on these unnatural toys,
And needs must murmur if it have not meat.
»32
XXVIII.
TO JULIET, IN ANSWER TO A
QUESTION.
[HYshouId I hate you,
love, or why despise
For that last proof of
tenderness you gave?
The battle is not
always to the brave,
Nor life's sublimest
I wisdom to the wise.
True courage often is
1 in frightened eyes,
And reason in sweet lips that only rave.
There is a weakness stronger than the grave,
And blood poured out has overcome the skies.
Nay, love, I honour you the more for this,
That you have rent the veil, and ushered in
A fellow soul to your soul's holy place.
And why should either blush that wehavebeen
One day in Eden, in our nakedness ?
'Tis conscience makes us sinners, not our sin.
*33
%.
XXIX.
TO JULIET, WHO WOULD COM,
FORT HIM.
DID not ask your
rity, dear. Your zeal
know. It cannot cure
me of my woes.
And you, in your
sweet happiness, who
knows,
Deserve it rather I
should pity feel
For what the coming
years from you conceal.
I did but cry, thou dear Samaritan,
Out of my bitterness of soul. Each man
Hath his own sorrow treading on his heel,
Ready to strike him, and must keep his shield
To his own back. Fate's arrows thickly fly,
And, if they strike not now, will strike at even.
And so I ask no pity. On life's field
The wounded crawl together, but their cry
Is not to one another but to Heaven.
*34
mm
r
XXX.
THE RELIGION OF LOVE.
JO thou but love me,
dear, with thy whole
heart
What care I for the
rest, for good or ill ?
WTmt for the peace of
soul good deeds im^
part?
wliatforthe tears mv
holy dreams distil ?
These cannot make my joy, nor shall they kill.
Thou only perfect peace and virtue art
And holiness for me and strength and will. .
So thou but love me with a perfect heart.
I ask thee now no longer to be wise;
No longer to be good, but loving me.
I ask thee nothing now but only this.
Henceforth my Bible, dear, shall be thine eyes,
My beads thy lips, my prayers thy constancy,
My heaven thine arms, eternity thy kiss.
*35
k 4
XXXI
TO ONE WHO LOVED HIM.
CANNOTloveyou,
love, as you love me,
In singleness of soul,
and faith untried.
I have no faith in any
destiny,
In any heaven, even
at your side.
Our hearts are all
too weak, the world
too wide,
You but a woman. If I dare to give.
Some thought, some tenderness, a little pride,
A little love, 'tis yours, love, to receive.
And do not grieve, though now the gih appear
A drop to your love's ocean. Time shall see.
Oh, I could prophesy : That day is sure,
Though not perhaps this week, nor month,
nor year,
"When your great love shall clean forgotten be,
And my poor tenderness shall yet endure.
'Tis not the trees that make the tallest show,
Which stand out stoutest when the tempests
blow.
»36
XXXII.
TO JULIET. EXHORTING HERTO
PATIENCE.
H Y do we fret at the
inconstancy
Of our frail hearts,
which cannot always
love?
Time rushes onward,
and we mortals move
Like waifs upon a
river, neither free
To halt nor hurry.
Sweet, if destiny
Throws us together for an hour, a day,
In the back-water of this quiet bay,
Let us rejoice. Before us lies the sea,
"Where we must all be lost in spite of love.
We dare not stop to question. Happiness
Lies in our hand unsought, a treasure trove.
Time has short patienceof man's vain distress;
And fate grows angry at too long delay;
And floods rise fast, and we are swept away.
>37
^
XXXIII.
TO JULIET. REMINDING HER OF
A PROMISE.
iH, Juliet, we have
] quarrelled with our
fate,
And fate has struck
us. "Wherefore do we
I cry?
"We prayed for liberty,
and now too late
Find liberty is this, to
say " good'hye."
The winter which we loved not has gone by,
And Spring is come. The gardens, which were
bare
When we first wandered through them, you
and I,
The prisoners of our own vain wishes, are
Now full of golden flowers. The very lane
Down to the sea is green. The cactus hedge
We saw cut down has sprouted new again,
And swallows have their nests on the cliffs
edge
Where we so often sat and dared complain
Because our joy was new, and called it pain.
■38
XXXIV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
2.
lES, Spring is come, but joy alas
| is gone,
Gone ere we knew it, while our
foolish eyes,
WTu'ch should have watched
its motions every one
Were looking elsewhere, at the hills, the skies,
Chasing vain thoughts, as children butterflies,
Until the hour struck and the day was done,
And we looked up in passionate surprise
To find that clouds had blotted out our sun.
Our joys are gone. And what is left to us,
Who loved not even love when it was here ?
WTiat but a voice which sobs monotonous
As these sad waves upon the rocks, the dear
Fond voice which once made music with our
own,
And which our hearts now ache to think upon.
»39
»■ ' ■«*
XXXV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
| LD memories are sweet, but
these are new
And smart like wounds yet
green. But one there is
which, for the cause that it
was dear to you
In days which counted upon greater bliss,
Is fairer now and dearer far than these;
And this the memory is of some hours spent
One afternoon when, seated at your knees,
I made narration (it was middle Lent
And you with Judas flowers had filled your lap) ,
Of the wise secret of these rhymes of mine,
And gave a promise, which behold I keep,
To write them out for you, each idle line,
Throwing you all my rubbish in one heap.
Poor stuff perhaps; and yet it made you weep.
140
i «e s
XXXVI.
TO JULIET. FEAR HAS CAST OUT
LOVE.
|IS not that love is
less or sorrow more
Than in the days
when first these
things began.
Even then you
doubted, and our
hearts were sore
And you rebelled be'
cause I was a man.
Even then you fought, and wrestled with my
plan
Of earthly bliss; what bitter anguish too
When at the hour decreed our passion ran
Out of our keeping and love claimed its due.
'Tis not love's fault we part, nor grief's. Alas,
One mightier now compels us with his nod.
The fire of heaven has touched us, and we pass
From pleasure's chastenings to a fiercer rod;
And fear has cast out love, for flesh is grass
And we are withered with the wrath of God.
Hi
HB5W
"-
XXXVII.
TO ONE WHO WOULD "REMAIN
FRIENDS/'
HAT is this prate
of friendship ? Kings
discrowned
Go forth, not citizens
but outlawed men.
If love has ceased to
five a loyal sound,
,et there at least be
silence. Once again
I go, proscribed,
exiled, dominionless
Out of your coasts, yet scorning to complain.
I grudge not your allegiance nor my bliss.
I yield the pleasure as I keep the pain.
Rebellion's rights are limited though strong.
The right to take gives not the right to give.
Mine were the sole right and prerogative
To give a title or forgive a wrong.
This gift of friendship was not yours to bring.
As I have lived in love I still will live
Or die, if needs must, and without reprieve,
Your lover yet, and kingdomless a king.
142
»BB!
XXXVIII.
TO ONE NOW ESTRANGED,
Y did you love me ?
Was it not enough
That the world loved
you, all the world
and I?
Or was your heart of
so sublime a stuff
That it might trifle
with inconstancy
And love and cease
to love and yet not die ?
Heaven was your throne by right of happiness
And earth your footstool. All things great and
high
Waited your bidding, love itself no less.
Yet, if you deigned to love, if from your place
In heaven you stooped, if, when your heart
was moved,
A thrill of human pleasure tinged your face,
If 'twas in weakness not in strength you loved,
Then there was causeto blush. Yet, loving, how
Shall you blush less to be apostate now?
*43
-X.}\.y\.Iyv.
FAREWELL TO JULIET.
i.
JULIET, farewell. I
i would not be forgiven
Even if I forgave.
I These words must be
The last between us
, two in earth or heaven,
j The last and bitterest.
You are henceforth free
For ever from my
! bitter words and me.
You shall not at my hand be further vexed
Wrth either love, reproach or jealousy,
(So help me heaven), in this world or the next.
Our souls are single for all time to come
And for eternity, and this farewell
Is as the trumpet note, the crack of doom,
WTiich heralds an eternal silence. Hell
Has no more fixed and absolute decree.
And heaven and hell may meet, yet never we.
144
XL.
THE SAME
(Continued)
IS strange we are thus parted,
not by death
Or man's device, but by our
own mad will,
We who have stood together
I on life's path
Thro' half a youth of good repute and ill,
Friends more than lovers. See, love's citadel
We held so stoutly 'gainst a world in arms
Lies all dismantled now, a sight to fill
The earth with lamentations and alarms.
WTiose was the fault ? I dare not ask nor say.
If there was treachery, 'tis best untold.
The price of treason we receive to-day
Is paid to both of us in evil gold.
Ay, take thy bitter freedom. 'Tis the fee
Of love betrayed and faith's apostacy.
\Al
\\
XLI.
THE SAME
(Continued).
3-
E may not meet. I could not for
pride's sake
Dissemble further, and I suffer
pain,
A palpable distinct and physical
ache,
When our eyes meet by accident, and when
I hear you talk in your pathetic strain
WTiich always moved me. Only yesterday,
As I was standing with a crowd of men
In the long corridor, you came my way
And chanced to stop, and thus by chance I
heard
A score of phrases uttered in that sad
Half-suppliant voice which once my spirit
stirred
To its foundations. Yet your theme was glad,
Strangers your hearers, w hat was in these
spells
To move me still ? A trick, and nothing else !
146
-J
XLII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
E vex each other with our
presence, I
By my regrets and by my
mocking race,
You by your laughter and
mad gaiety,
And both by cruel thoughts of happier days.
Is then the world so narrow that we pace
These streets like prisoners still with eyes
askance,
As bound together in the fell embrace
Of a dark chain which bars deliverance ?
Nay, go your ways. I will not vex you more.
Make your own terms with life, while you are
fair.
There is none better learned in woman's lore.
X ou yet may take revenge on grief and care,
And 'twas your nature ever to be gay.
Why should I scoff? Be merry while you may.
H7
I2
XLIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
5-
DO not love you. To have
said this once
Had seemed to both of us a
monstrous lie,
An idle boast, love's last
extravagance
Or the mere paradox of vanity.
Now it is true and yet more hideously
More strangely monstrous. I, no less than you,
Here own at length the worm which cannot
die,
The burden of a pain for ever new.
This is the "pang of loss/' the bitterest
"Which hell can give. We are shut out from
heaven
And never more shall look upon love's face,
Being with those who perish unforgiven.
Never to see love's face! Ah, pain in pain,
Which we do well to weep and weep again.
J48
XLIV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
b.
lET we shall live without love,
ias some live
Without their limbs, their
J senses, maimed or deaf.
We even shall forget love, and
I shall thrive
And prosper and grow fat upon our grief.
You are consoled already more than half,
And wear your sorrow lightly. I will boast
No longer the refusal of relief
Than as a decent mourner of hopes crossed.
We yet shall laugh, and laughter is more loud
When following tears. The men who drive a
hearse
Are not the least lighthearted of the crowd.
See, we have made Love's epitaph in verse
And fairly buried him. God's ways are best.
Then home to pleasure and the funeral feast.
l 49 13
XLV.
THE SAME
(Continued).
7-
O you remember how I laughed
at you
In the Beaulieu woods, and how
I made my peace ?
It was your thirtieth birthday,
! and you threw
Stones like a schoolgirl at the chestnut'trees.
The heavens were light above us and the
breeze.
Your Corydon and all the merry crew
Had wandered to a distance, busier bees
Than we, who cared notwhere the hazels grew.
We were alone at last. I had been teasing
You with the burden of years left behind.
You were too fair to find my wit displeasing,
And I too tender to be less than kind.
Your pebbles struck me. " Wretch," I cried.
The word
Entered our hearts that instant like a sword.
150
:-T-?T--~ ir -
m-
XLVI.
THE SAME
(Continued) .
8.
PRICE happy fools! What
wisdom shall we learn
In this world or the next, if
next there be,
More deep, more full, more
worthy our concern
Than that first word of folly taught us ? We
Had suddenly grown silent. I could see
Your cheek had lost a little of its hue,
And your lips trembled, and beseechingly
Your blue eyes turned to mine, and well I knew
Your woman's instinct had divined my speech,
The meaning of a word so lightly spoken.
The word was a confession, clear to each,
A pledge as plain and as distinct a token
As that of Peter at his master's knees,
"Thou knowest that I love thee more than
these."
»5«
u
XLVII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
9-
SEE you, Juliet, still, with your
straw hat
Loaded with vines, and with
I your dear pale face,
On which those thirty years so
lightly sat,
And the white outline of your muslin dress.
You wore a little fichu trimmed with lace
And crossed in front, as was the fashion then,
Bound at your waist with a broad band or sash,
All white and fresh and virginally plain.
There was a sound of shouting far away
Down in the valley, as they called to us,
And you, with hands clasped seeming still to
pray
Patience of fate, stood listening to me thus
Wrth heaving bosom. There a rose lay curled.
It was the reddest rose in all the world.
152
.
XLVIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
10.
THINK there never was a
dearer woman,
j A better, kinder, truer than you
were,
I A gentler spirit more divinely
I human
Than yours with your sweet melancholy air
Of tender gaiety, which seemed like care,
And in your voice a sob as of distress
At the world's ways, its sin and its despair,
Being yourself all strange to wickedness.
Now you are neither gentle, kind, nor good,
And you have sorrows of your own to grieve,
And in your mirth compassion has no mood;
You wear no more your heart upon your sleeve,
And if your voice still sobs 'tis with a sense
Of sorrow's power, grief's wealth, experience.
»53
XLIX.
THE SAME
(Continued).
n.
J "WOMAN with a past."
What happier omen
Could heart desire for mistress
or for friend ?
Phoenix of friends, and most
divine of women,
Skilled in all fence to venture or defend
And with love's science at your fingers' end,
No tears to vex, no ignorance to bore,
A fancy ripe, the zest which sorrows lend ! . .
I would to God we had not met before.
I would to God ! and yet to God I would
That we had never met. To see you thus
Is grief and wounds and poison to my blood.
Oh, this is sacrilege and foul abuse.
You were a thing for honour, not vile use,
Not for the mad world's wicked sinks and
stews.
154
L.
THE SAME
(Continued).
12.
HAT have I done? What gross
impiety
Prompted my hand thus against
God and good ?
Was there not joy on Earth
enough for me
That I must scale the Heaven where you stood,
And with my sinful blood pollute your blood ?
You were the type of wise sweet sanctity,
Of that unearthly half of womanhood
Which well redeems the rest. Oh, Juliet, we
Sinned in a temple,- and our tears to-day
Appeal in vain to heaven which dares not hear.
God is not always mocked. And thus we pay
Our uttermost debt unheeded, tear on tear
And scoffon scoff and sin heaped up on sin,
While there is justice on the earth to men.
155
LI.
THE SAME
(Continued).
13-
lE planted love, and lo it bred a
I brood
Of lusts and vanities and sense/-
less joys.
We planted love, and you have
gathered food
Of every bitter herb which fills and cloys.
Your meat is loud excitement and mad noise,
Your wine the unblest ambition of command
O'er hearts of men, of dotards, idiots, boys.
These are the playthings fitted to your hand,
These are your happiness. You weep no more,
But I must weep. My heaven has been defiled.
My sin has found me out and smites me sore,
And folly, justified of her own child,
Rules all the empire where love reigned of yore,
Folly red/cheeked but rotten to the core.
156
LIL
THE SAME
(Continued) .
14.
AME, impotent conclusion to
youth's dreams
Vast as all heaven ! See, what
glory lies
Entangled here in these base
stratagems,
What virtue done to death ! O glorious sighs,
Sublime beseechings, high cajoleries,
Fond wraths, brave raptures, all that sometime
was
Our daily bread of gods beneath the skies,
How are ye ended, in what utter loss !
Time was, time is, and time is yet to come,
Till even time itself shall have its end.
These were eternal, and behold, a tomb.
Come, let us laugh and eat and drink. God
send
W^hat all the world must need one day as we,
Speedy oblivion, rest for memory.
157
LIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
l 5-
| ARE WELL, then. Itis finished.
I forego
With this all right in you, even
that of tears.
If I have spoken hardly, it will
show
How much I loved you. With you disappears
A glory, a romance of many years.
What you may be henceforth I will not know.
The phantom of your presence on my fears
Is impotent at length for weal or woe.
Your past, your present, all alike must fade
In a new land of dreams where love is not.
Then kiss me and farewell. The choice is made
And we shall live to see the past forgot,
If not forgiven. See, I came to curse,
Yet stay to bless. I know not which is worse.
158
PART III.
GODS AND FALSE GODS.
LIV.
HE DESIRES THE IMPOSSIBLE.
B F it were possible the
fierce sun should,
'I Standing in heaven un/
loved, companionless,
Enshrined be in some
white'bosomed cloud,
And so forget his rage
and loneliness;
' If it were possible the
bitter seas
Should suddenly grow sweet, till at their brink
Birds with bright eyes should stoop athirst and
drink;
If these were possible; and if to these
It should be proved that love has sometimes
been
'Twixt lambs and leopards, doves and hawks,
that snow
Clasps the bare rocks, that rugged oaks grow
freen
n the west wind, that pinkest blossoms blow
Upon May's blackest thorn; then, only then,
I might believe that love between us two
Was still in heaven's gift, sweet child. And you?
161
m i
^ff? 1
5S-*H=«~-r-~
LV.
ST. VALENTINE'S DAY.
|0«DAY,allday,I
rode upon the down,
Wrth hounds and
horsemen, a brave
company.
On this side in its 1
glory lay the sea,
On that the Sussex
weald, a sea of brown.
The wind was light,
and brightly the sun shone,
And still we galloped on from gorse to gorse.
And once, when checked, a thrush sang, and
my horse
Pricked his quick ears as to a sound unknown.
I knew the Spring was come. I knew it even
Better than all by this, that through my chase
In bush and stone and hill and sea and heaven
I seemed to see and follow still your face.
Your face my quarry was. For it I rode,
My horse a thing of wings, myself a god.
162
LVI.
TO ONE WHOM HE DARED NOT
LOVE.
S one who, in a desert
wandering
Alone and faint be*
neath a pitiless sky,
And doubting in his
heart if he shall bring
His bones back to his
kindred or there die,
Finds at his feet a
treasure suddenly-
Such as would make him for all time a king,
And so forgets his fears and with keen eye
Falls to accounting each new precious thing:
So was I when you told me yesterday
The tale of your dear love. Awhile I stood
Astonished and enraptured, and my heart
Began to count its treasures. Now dismay
Steals back my joy, and terror chills my blood,
And I remember only "we must part."
163
m2
LVII.
ON A LOST OPPORTUNITY.
might, if you had
willed, have conquered
heaven.
Once only in our lives
before the gate
Of Paradise we stood,
one fortunate even,
And gazed in sudden
rapture through the.
grate.
And, while you stood astonished, I, our fate
Venturing, pushed the latch and found it free.
There stood the Tree of Knowledge fair and great
Beside the Tree of Life. One instant we
Stood in that happy garden, guardianless.
My hands already turned towards the tree
And in another moment we had known
The taste of joy and immortality
And been ourselves as gods. But in distress
You thrust me back with supplicating arms
And eyes of terror, till the impatient sun
Had time to set and till the heavenly host
Rushed forth on us with clarions and alarms
And cast us out for ever, blind and lost.
164
LVIII.
TO ONE, ON HER WASTE OF
TIME.
H Ypractise, love,
this small economy
Of your heart's
favours ? Can you
keep a kiss
To be enjoyed in age ?
and would the free
Expense of pleasure
leave you penniless ?
Nay, nay. Be wise.
Believe me, pleasure is
A gambler's token, only gold to-day.
The day of love is short, and every bliss
Untasted now is a bliss thrown away.
Twere pitiful, in truth, such treasures should
Lie by like misers' crusts till mouldy grown.
Think you the hand of age will be less rude
In touching your sweet bosom than my own ?
Alas, what matter, when our heads are grey,
Whether you loved or did not love to-day r
i%
m3
nam
LIX.
THE HAUNTED HOUSE.
OW loud the storm
blew all that bitter night !
The loosened ivy tap'
ping on the pane
woke me and woke,
again and yet again,
Till I was full awake
and sat upright.
I listened to the noises
of the night,
presently 1 heard, disguised yet plain,
A footstep on the stair which mounted light
Towards me, and my heart outbeat the rain.
I knew that it was you. I knew it even
Before the door, which by design ajar
"Waited your coming, had disclosed my fate.
I felt a wind upon my face from heaven.
I felt the presence of a life. My hair
"Was touched as by a spirit. Insensate
I drew you to my bosom. Ah, too late!
I clutched the darkness. There was nothing
there.
166
-
JMW ..■.>■ ft i riif
LX.
THE TRIUMPH OF LOVE.
]H, Love, dear Love.
In vain I scoff. In vain
I ply my barren wit,
I and jest at thee.
Thou heedest not, or
dost forgive the pain,
And in thy own good
time and thy own way,
Waiting my silence,
thou dost vanquish me.
Thou comest at thy will in sun or rain
And at the hour appointed, a spring day,
An autumn night: and lo, I serve again.
Forgive me, touch me, chide me.what to thee,
God that thou art, are these vain shifts of mine ?
Let me but know thee. Thou alone art wise.
I ask not to be wise or great or free
Or aught but at thy knees and wholly thine,
Thus, and to feel thy hand upon mine eyes.
167
m4
LXI.
TO ONE, EXCUSING HIS POVERTY.
H ! love, impute it not
to me a sin
That my poor soul
thus beggared comes
to thee.
My soul apilgrim was,
in search of thine,
And met these
accidents by land
and sea.
The world was hard, and took its usury,
Its toll for each new night in each new inn;
And every road had robber bands to fee;
And all, even kindness, must be paid in coin.
Behold my scrip is empty, my heart bare.
I give thee nothing who my all would give.
My pilgrimage is finished, and I fare
Bare to my death, unless with thee I live.
Ah ! give, love, and forgive that I am poor.
Ah ! take me to thy arms and ask no more.
168
i~T:C
LXII.
TO ONE WHO WOULD MAKE
A CONFESSION.
H ! leave the Past to
bury its own dead.
The Past is naught to
us, the Present all.
i| Wliat need of last
year's leaves to strew
Love's bed?
Wliat need of ghosts
to grace a festival ?
I would not, if I could,
those days recall,
Those days not ours. For us the feast is spread,
The lamps are lit, and music plays withal.
Then let us love and leave the rest unsaid.
This island is our home. Around it roar
Great gulfs and oceans, channels, straits, and
seas.
W^hat matter in what wreck we reached the
shore,
So we both reached it ? We can mock at these.
Oh ! leave the Past, if Past indeed there be.
I would not know it. I would know but thee.
169
LXIII.
THE PLEASURES OF LOVE.
DO not care for
kisses.'Tis a debt
We paid for the first
privilege of love.
These are the rains of
April which have wet
Our fallow hearts and
forced their germs to
|j move.
J Now the green corn
has sprouted. Each new day-
Brings better pleasures, a more dear surprise,
The blade, the ear, the harvest : and our way
Leads through a region wealthy grown and
wise.
We now compare our fortunes. Each his store
Displays to kindred eyes of garnered grain,
Two happy farmers, learned in love's lore,
W^ho weigh and touch and argue and complain.
Dear endless argument! Yet sometimes we
Even as we argue kiss. There ! Let it be.
170
LXIV.
HE APPEALS AGAINST HIS
BOND.
N my distress Love
made me sign a bond,
A cruel bond. 'Twas
by necessity
wrung from a foolish
heart, alas, too fond,
Too blindly fond, its
error to foresee.
And now my soul's
estate, in jeopardy,
_ies to a pledge it never can redeem.
Love's loan was love, one hour of ecstasy,
His penalty eternal loss of him.
See, I am penniless, the forfeit paid,
And go a beggar forth from thy dear sight,
My pound of more than flesh too strictly
weighed
And cut too near the heart. Fair Israelite,
Thy plea was just. Thy right has been
confessed.
And yet a work of mercy were twice blessed.
m
LXV.
TO ONE WHO SPOKE ILLOF HIM.
jH AT is your quarrel
with me, in Love's
name,
Fair queen of wrath ?
W^hat evil have I
done,
"What treason to the
thought of our dear
shame
Subscribed or plotted ?
Is my heart less one
In its obedience to your stern decrees
Than on the day when first you said/' I please,"
And with your lips ordained our union?
Am I not now, as then, upon my knees ?
You bade me love you, and the deed was done,
And when you cried/' Enough," I stopped, and
when
You bade me go I went, and when you said
" Forget me" I forgot. Alas, what wrong
Would you avenge upon a loyal head,
WTiich ever bowed to you in joy and pain,
That you thus scourge me with your pitiless
tongue ?
172
LXVI.
TO ONE WHO HAD LEFT HER
CONVENT TO MARRY.
, YEAR agoyou gave
yourself to God.
Itwas a noble giftand
j nobly given,
And we who watched
you as you fearless
trod,
Like one inspired,
your pilgrimage to
Heaven,
Rejoiced, poor sinners, there was still this leaven
For a bad world, this bud on Aaron's rod,
This virgin still at watch with the wise seven,
And envying you we almost envied God.
A year ago ! Another service now
Moves your delight, another noble whim,
Another brides groom and another vow.
Again we envy you and envy him,
First God's, then Man's ! Your love all ranks
would level.
W^ho knows ? Next year may add a third, the
Devil.
*73
/
mm
LXVII.
THE THREE AGES OF WOMAN.
OVE, in thy youth,
a stranger, knelt to
thee,
"With cheeks all red
and golden locks all
curled,
And cried, " Sweet
child, if thou wilt
worship me,
I Thou shalt,possess
the kingdoms of the world."
But you looked down and said/' I know you not,
Nor want I other kingdom than my soul."
Till Love in shame, convicted of his plot,
Left you and turned him to some other goal.
And this discomfiture which you had seen
Long served you for your homily and boast,
While, of your beauty and yourself the queen,
You lived a monument of vain love crossed,
Wrth scarce a thought of that which might /
have been
To scare you with the ghost of pleasures lost.
174
=
^a
LXVIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
2.
IOUR youth flowed on, a river
chaste and fair,
I Till thirty years were written
to your name.
A wife, a mother, these the
I titles were
Which conquered for you the world's fairest /
fame. /
In all things you were wise but in this one,
That of your wisdom you yourself did doubt.
Youth spent like age, no joy beneath the sun.
Your glass of beauty vainly running out.
Then suddenly again, ere well you knew,
Love looked upon you tenderly, yet sad:
"Are these wise follies, then, enough for you ? "
He said: "Love's wisdom were itself less mad."
And you : " What wouldst thou of me ?" " My
bare due,
In token of what joys may yet be had."
V5
w~~*=
LXIX.
THE SAME
(Continued).
(GAIN Love left you. With
appealing eyes
You watched him go, and lips
apart to speak.
He left you, and once more
the sun did rise
And the sun set, and week trod close on week
And month on month, till you had reached
the goal
Of forty years, and life's full waters grew j
To bitterness and flooded all your soul,
Making you loathe old things and pine for new.
And you into the wilderness had fled,
And in your desolation loud did cry,
" Oh, for a hand to turn these stones to bread ! "
Then in your ear Love whispered scornfully,
"Thou too, poor fool, thou, even thou," he
said,
" Shalt taste thy little honey ere thou die."
i 7 6
LXX.
SIBYLLINE BOOKS.
[HEN first, a boy,
] at your fair knees I
kneeled,
'Twas with a worthy
offering. In my hand
My young life's book I
held, a volume sealed,
WTiich none but you,
I deemed, might
understand.
And you I did entreat to loose the band
And read therein your own soul's destiny.
But,Tarquin4ike, you turned from my
demand,
Too proudly fair to find your fate in me.
WhennowIcome,alas,whathandshaveturned
Those virgin pages ! Some are torn away,
And some defaced, and some with passion
burned,
And some besmeared with life's least holy clay.
Say, shall I offer you these pages wet
With blood and tears ? and will your sorrow read
What your joy heeded not ? Unopened yet
One page remains. It still may hold a fate,
A counsel for the day of utter need.
Nay, speak, sad heart, speak quick. The hour
is late.
Age threatens us. The Gaul is at the gate.
177 n 1
■ —
LXXI.
ON READING THE MEMOIRS OF
M. D'ARTAGNAN.
HYwas I born in this
degenerate age ?
Or rather why, a
thousand times,
with soul
Of such degenerate
stuff that a mute rage
Is all its reason, tears
the only toll
It takes on life, and
impotence its goal ?
Why was I born to this sad heritage
Of fierce desires which cannot fate control,
Of idle hopes life never can assuage ?
"Why was I born thus weak ? Oh, to have been
A merry fool, at jest with destiny;
A free hand ready and a heart as free;
A ruffler in the camps of Mazarin !
Oh, for the honest soul of d'Artagnan,
Twice happy knave, a Gascon and a man !
> 7 8
v_
—
,
LXXII.
THE MORTE D'ARTHUR.
I H E S E are the tales
in all their valorous
ilore
Of that famed frolic
of the Table Round.
No shamefaced
verse, but stout prose
to the core,
As Malory wrote it
and our fathers found.
Tales touching still, and still through time re
nowned,
But less, methinks, for their high deeds that
bore
Their crests so proudly than the one lost sound
Of Lancelot's step at the Queen's chamber door.
How their sighs echo ! Think, if then she had
made
Another answer than her human "yes,"
And been more valiant and denied and slept !
Should we still weep o'er Bors and Galahad,
The Sancgreal's quest, Gawayne in wrath
equipped,
Or all King Arthur's jousts in Lyonnesse ?
l 79
n2
LXXIII.
THE TWO HIGHWAYMEN.
LONG have had a
quarrel set withTime,
Because he robbed
me. Every day of life
Was wrested from me
after bitter strife,
I never yet could see
the sun go down
But I was angry in
my heart, nor hear
The leaves fall in the wind without a tear
Over the dying summer. I have known
No truce with Time nor, Time's accomplice,
Death.
The fair world is the witness of a crime
Repeated every hour. For life and breath
Are sweet to all who live ; and bitterly
The voices of these robbers of the heath
Sound in each ear and chill the passer by.
What have we done to thee, thou monstrous
Time ?
What have we done to Death that we must
die?
180
LXXIV.
FROM THE FRENCH OF ANVERS.
Y heart has its secret,
my soul its mystery,
A love which is eternal
begotten in a day.
The ill is long past
healing.WTiy should
I speak to-day ?
For none have ears
to hear, and, least of
all, she.
Alas, I shall have lived unseen tho' ever near,
For ever at her side, for ever too alone.
I shall have lived my life unknowing and un/
known,
Askingnaught,daringnaught,receivingnaught
from her.
And she, whom heaven made kind and chaste
and fair,
Shall go undoubtingon, the whileupon her way
The murmur of my love shall fill the land.
Till, reading here perchance severe and un/
aware
These lines so full of her, she shall look up
and say,
** Who was this woman then ?" and shall not
understand.
181
«3
LXXV.
TO ONE TO WHOM HE HAD
BEEN UNJUST.
F I was angry once
that you refused
The bread I asked
and offered me a
stone,
Deeming the rights of
bounty thus abused
And my poor beggary
I but trampled on,
■* Believe me now I
would that wrong atone
With such submission as a heart can show,
Asking no bread of life but that alone
Your dear heart proffered and my pride let go.
Give me your help, your pity, what you will,
Your pardon for a sin, your act of grace
For a rebellion vanquished and undone,
The stone I once refused, that precious stone
Your friendship, so my thoughts may serve
you still
Even if I never more behold your face.
182
LXXVI.
A MOCKERY OF LIFE.
A Triple Sonnet.
OD, what a mock.'
ery is this life of
ours!
Cast forth in blood
and pain from our
mother's womb,
Most like an excre^
ment, and weeping
showers
Of senseless tears:
unreasoning, naked, dumb,
The symbol of all weakness and the sum :
Our very life a sufferance. Presently,
Grown stronger, we must fight for standing'
room
Upon the earth, and the bare liberty
To breathe and move.We crave the right to toil.
We push, we strive, we jostle with the rest.
We learn new courage, stifle our old fears,
Stand with stiff backs, take part in every broil.
It may be that we love, that we are blest.
It may be, for a little space of years,
We conquer fate and half forget our tears.
183
n 4
LXXVII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
ND then fate strikes us. First
our joys decay.
Youth, with its pleasures, is a
tale soon told.
We grow a little poorer day
by day.
Old friendships falter. Loves grow strangely
cold.
In vain we shift our hearts to a new hold
And barter joy for joy, the less for less.
We doubt our strength, our wisdom, and our
gold.
We stand alone, as in a wilderness
Of doubts and terrors. Then, if we be wise,
We make our terms with fate and, while we
may,
Sell our life's last sad remnant for a hope.
And it is wisdom thus to close our eyes.
But for the foolish, those who cannot pray,
What else remains of their dark horoscope
But a tall tree and courage and a rope ?
184
O
LXXVIII.
THE SAME
(Continued),
3-
ND who shall tell what igno^
miny death
Has yet in store for us ; what
abject fears
Even for the best of us; what
fights for breath;
What sobs,what supplications/what wild tears;
What impotence of soul against despairs
Which blot out reason ? The last trembling
thought
Of each poor brain, as dissolution nears,
Is not of fair life lost, of heaven bought
And glory won. 'Tis not the thought of grief;
Of friends deserted; loving hearts which bleed;
Wrves, sisters, children who around us weep.
But only a mad clutching for relief
From physical pain, importunate Nature's
need;
The search as for a womb where we may creep
Back from the world, to hide : perhaps to sleep.
185
LXXIX.
WHO WOULD LIVE AGAIN?
|H, who would live
again to suffer loss ?
Once in my youth I
battled with my fate,
'( Grudging my days to
death. I would have
j won
A place by violence
beneath the sun.
I took my pleasures
madly as by force,
Even the air of heaven was a prize.
I stood a plunderer at death's very gate,
And all the lands of life I did o'errun
Wrth sack and pillage. Then I scorned to die,
Save as a conqueror. The treasuries
Of love I ransacked; pity, pride, and hate.
All that can make hearts beat or brim men's eyes
With living tears I took as robes to wear.
But see, now time has struck me on the hip.
I cannot hate nor love. My senses are
Struck silent with the silence of my lip.
No courage kindles in my heart to dare,
No strength to do. The world's last phantoms
slip
Out of my grasp, and naught is left but pain.
Love, life, vain strength. Oh, who would live
again ?
186
LXXX.
COLD COMFORT.
HERE is no comfort
underneath the sun.
Youth turns to age;
riches are quickly
spent;
Pride breeds us pain,
our pleasures punish'
ment,
The very courage
which we count upon
A single night of fever shall break down,
And love is slain by fear. Death last of all
Spreads out his nets and watches for our fall.
There is no comfort underneath the sun !
When thou art old, O man, if thou wert proud
Be humble; pride will here avail thee not.
There is no courage which can conquer death.
Forget that thou wert wise. Nay, keep thy
breath
For prayer, that so thy wisdom be forgot
And thou perhaps get pity of thy God.
187
LXXXI.
AMOUR OBLIGE.
COULD forgive you,
dearest, all the folly
Your heart has
dreamed. Alas, as
we grow old,
We need more
vigorous cures for
melancholy,
A stronger nutriment
for hearts grown cold.
We need in face of weakness to be bold.
We need our folly to keep fate at bay.
Oh, we need madness in the manifold
Doubts and despairs which herald our decay.
I could forgive you all and more than all,
Yet, dearest, though for us fate waves his hand
And we accept it as the common lot
To meet no more at this life's festival,
It were unseemly you should take your stand,
Now my heart's citadel is laid in siege,
In open field with those who love me not.
Love has a rank which surely should oblige.
188
LXXXII.
TO ONE UNFORGOTTEN.
OU are not false,
perhaps, as lovers say,
Meaning the act :
Alas, that guilt was
mine.
Nor, maybe, have you
bowed at other shrine
Than the true god's
where first you
learned to pray.
I know the idols round you. They are clay,
Mere Dagons to the courage half divine
Which bears you scathless still thro' sap and
mine
And breach and storm upon your virgin way.
Alas, I know your virtue ; but your heart,
How have you treated it? I sometimes see,
Wlien nights are long, a vision chaste and true
Of pale pathetic eyes which gaze on me
In love and grief eternal. Then I start,
Crying aloud, and reach my arms to you.
189
LXXXIII.
TO ONE WHOM HE HAD LOVED
TOO LONG,
H Y do I cling to
thee, sad love ? Too
long
Thou bringest me
neither pleasure to
my soul
Nor profit to my
reason save in
song,
My daily utterance.
See, thy beggar's dole
Of foolish tears cannot my tears cajole;
Thy laughter doth my laughter grievous wron g ;
Thy anger angereth me; thou heapest coal
Of fire upon my head the drear night long
"With thy forgiveness. W^hat is this thou wilt?
Mine ears have ceased to hear, my tongue to
speak,
And naught is left for my spent heart to do.
Love long has left the feast; the cup is spilt.
Let us go too. The dawn begins to break,
And there is mockery in this heaven of blue.
190
LXXXIV.
HE WOULD LEAD A BETTER
LIFE.
AM tired of folly,
tired of my own ways.
Love is a strife. I do
not want to strive.
If I had foes I now
would make my peace^
If I less wedded were
SI now would wive.
\ I would do service to
my kind, contrive
Something of good for men, some happiness
For those who in the world still love and live;
And, as my fathers did, so end my days.
I would earn praise, I too, of honest men.
I would repent in sackcloth if needs be.
I would serve God and expiate my sin,
Abjuring love and thee : ay, even thee.
I would do this, dear love. But what am I
To will or do ? As we have lived we die.
191
LXXXV.
TO JULIET, ON HERAPOSTASY.
|OW dare I, Juliet, in
j love's kindness be
j Your counsellor for
j these mad days of war,
I a sworn Montagu, to
| liberty
Bound by all oaths
5 which men least lightly
I swear?
How shall I aid you,
who enlisted are
In a strange camp/neath a strange captaincy,
Nor urge rebellion to that lurid star
Wliich mocks the captive nations held in fee ?
Nay, bid me not thus falsify my griefs.
I cannot turn my creed nor change my king.
Around me crumble my life's last beliefs,
But in the wreck of faiths to faith I cling.
Lo, this my message is, till time shall die,
"Though all abandon these, yet never I."
192
LXXXVI.
A RELAPSE.
THOUGHT that I
had done with fleshly
things,
That in the azure of
high thought my soul
Had learned to fly on
unsubstantial wings
To a new heaven, a
|j sublimer goal.
J I thought that I was
wise beneath the cowl
Of my dead hopes, beyond all power of Spring's
Most eloquent music to again cajole,
And that my service was the King of kings'.
But look, alas, howthoughtless thought can be,
For to me thinking thus one ventured in
Bearing a letter and I read your name,
Then in an instant through my limbs a flame
Of pleasure ran, and wrought such change in me
That I was eager for all loveliest sin.
193
o t
LXXXV1I.
AN AUTUMN SONNET.
[ESE little presents
j of your tenderness,
I Although less grand a
I gift than was your
! love,
i Are dear to me in this
October stress
Of wind and war and
whirling leaves above.
They comfort my
soul's autumn, and they prove
How little time can do, to ban or bless,
How much ourselves. You willed the years
should move
Back in their cycle. And behold, love, this !
Now, therefore, let us mark this fortunate day,
And use it for our feast day. Every year
Let us, when winds are high and the leaves fall,
Hold in this house our love's memorial,
Sitting thus hand in hand. Still let me lay,
As in the happy days, ere leaves were sere,
My head upon your lap and call you "dear."
194
LXXXVIII.
THE COMING OF LOVE.
OU ask me how this
wonder came about.
'Twasthusithappened.
I, that day, alone,
Still weak and wrapped
in white and without
thought,
Had wandered forth
towards the dial/stone.
No voice had told me
to prepare a throne
For my King's coming; neither had I wrought
New robes for him, nor woven any crown,
Nor any speech my stammering lips had
taught.
He came unheralded. His dark eyes were
His only messengers for my delight.
These told me of his presence and his will,
And bade me fear not I was less than fair,
But that I ever more thus clothed in white
His grace should find. And so I serve him still.
*95
o 2
LXXXIX.
FRIENDS.
FELL among the
thieves awhile ago,
Who beat and stripped
me; and, thus used, I
fled
For comfort to the
arms of one I know
WTio is to me a sister,
being wed
To my heart's kinsx
man. But "Alas," she said,
"Your nakedness will bring our house to woe.
" Prithee begone." She blushed, and turned
her head,
And left me doubting with which foot to go.
Friends in the street beheld me, old and new.
The newfriends nodded; buttheolder stepped
In haste from my reproachful eyes and me.
They feared a creditor for sympathy,
And so they fled. One only of the crew,
A harlot, stopped me, kissed my wounds and
wept.
196
xc.
A WOMAN'S SONNETS.
F the past year were
offered me again,
With choice of good
and ill before me set,
Should I be wiser for
the bliss and pain
And dare to choose
that we had never met ?
Could I find heart
those happy hours
to miss,
When love began unthought of and unspoke
That first strange day when by a sudden kiss
We knew each other s secret and awoke ?
Ah, no ! not even to escape the smart
Of that fell agony I underwent,
Flying from thee and my own traitor heart,
Till doubts and dreads and battlings overspent,
I knew at last that thou or love or fate
Had conquered and repentance was too late.
197
°3
.
XCI.
THE SAME
(Continued).
2.
AY, dear one, ask me not to
leave thee yet.
Let me a little longer hold thy
hand.
Too soon it is to bid me to
forget
The joys I was so late to understand.
The future holds but a blank face for me,
The past is all confused with tears and grey,
But the sweet present, while thy smiles I see,
Is perfect sunlight, an unclouded day.
Speak not of parting, not at least this hour,
Though well I know Love cannot Time outlast.
Let me grow wiser first and gain more power,
More strength of will to deal with mydeadpast.
Love me in silence still, one short hour's space :
'Tis all I ask of thee, this little grace.
198
1
XCII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
tHERE is the pride for which
I once was blamed,
My vanity which held its head
so high ?
Wlio would believe them,
seeing me thus tamed,
Thus subject, here as at thy feet I lie,
Pleading for love which now is all my life,
Craving a word for memory's rage to keep,
Asking a sign to still my inward strife,
Petitioning a touch to soothe my sleep ?
Who would now guess them, as I kiss the
ground
On which the feet of him I love have trod,
And bow before his voice whose least sweet
sound
Speaks louder to me than the voice of God ;
And knowing all the while that one dark day,
Spite of my worship, thou wilt turn away ?
199
04
XCIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
4-
HOULD ever the day come
when this drear world
Shall read the secret which so
close I hold,
Should taunts and jeers at my
I bowed head be hurled,
And all my love and all my shame be told,
I could not, as some doughtier women do,
Fling jests and gold and live the scandal down,
Nor, knowing all fame's bruitings to be true,
Keep a proud face and brave the talk of town.
I have no courage for such tricks and ways,
No wish to flaunt a once welkhonoured name.
I have too dear a thought of earlier days,
Too deep a dread of my deserved shame.
So, when it comes, with one last suppliant cry
For pardon from my wronged ones, I must die.
200
xcrv.
THE SAME
(Continued).
IHATE'ER the cost to me,
J with this farewell,
I shall not see thee, speak to
thee again.
If some on Earth must feel
I the pangs of Hell,
Mine only be it who have earned my pain.
No matter if my life be blank and dead,
Bankrupt of pleasure: it is better so
Than risk dishonour on a once loved head,
Than link all loved ones with my own sole woe.
I have no claim to bring grief's shade on these,
To mix their pure life's waters with my wine,
To vex the dead, dear dead, in their new peace
Wrth knowledge of my sin and great decline.
For these I leave thee, and, though life be rent
Wrth the rude fight, think not I shall relent.
201
xcv.
THE SAME
(Continued).
6.
HAT have I lost? The faith I
I had that Right
j Must surely prove itself
than 111 more strong.
, For see how little my poor
Sprayers had might
To save me, at the trial's pinch, from wrong.
What have I lost ? The truth of my proud eyes
Scorning deceit. Behold me here to-day
Leading a double life, at shifts with lies,
And trembling lest each shadow should betray.
No longer with my lost ones may I mourn,
WTio came to me in sleep and breathed soft
words.
Sleepless I lie and fearful and forlorn,
Wrth their love's edge still wounding like a
sword's.
In thy dear presence only I find rest.
To thee alone naught needs to be confessed.
202
XCVI.
THE SAME
(Continued).
~7,
J
jH AT have I gained ? A little
charity?
I never more may dare to fling
a stone
At any weakness, nor make
boast that I
A better fence or fortitude had shown;
Somelearning? Iinlove's lore have grown wise,
Plucked apples of the evil and the good,
Made one short trespass into Paradise
And known the full taste of forbidden food.
But love, if it be gold, has much alloy,
And -J would gladly buy back ignorance,
But for the thought which still is my heart's joy
That once your life grew happier in my hands,
That in your darkest and most troubled hour
I had, like Jesse's son, a soothing power.
203
XCVII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
8.
SUE thee not for pity on
my case.
If I have sinned, the judg^
ment has begun.
My joy was but one day of
all the days,
And clouds have blotted it and hid the sun.
Thou wert so much to me ! But soon I knew
How small a part could mine be in thy life,
That all a woman may endure or do
Counts little to her hero in the strife.
I do not blame thee who deserved no blame ;
Thou hast so many worlds within thy ken.
I staked my all upon a losing game,
Knowing the nature and the needs of men,
And knowing too how quickly pride is spent.
With open eyes to Love and Death I went.
204
XCVIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
9-
HE day draws nigh,methinks,
when I could stay
Calm in thy presence with no
dream of ill,
When, having put all earthly
ness away,
I could be near thee, touching thee, and still
Feel no mad throbbing at my foolish heart,
No sudden rising of unbidden tears,
Could mark thee come and go, to meet or part,
Without the gladness and without the fears.
Havepatiencewithmethenforthis short space.
I shall be wise, but may not yet unmoved
See a strange woman put into my place
And happy in thy love, as I was loved :
This were too much. Ah, let me not yet see
The love'light in thine eyes, and not for me.
205
XCIX.
THE SAME
(Continued).
10.
OVE, ere I go, forgive me
each least wrong,
Each trouble I unwittingly
have wrought.
My heart, my life, my tears
to thee belong;
Yet have I erred, maybe, through too fond
thought;
One sin, most certainly, I need to atone :
The sin of loving thee while yet un wooed.
Mine only was this wrong, this guilt alone.
The woman tempted thee from ways of good.
Forgive me too, ere thy dear pity cease,
That I denied thee, vexed thee with delay,
Sought my soul's coward shelter, not thy peace,
And having won thee still awhile said nay.
Forgive me this, that I too soon, too late,
Too wholly gave a love disconsolate.
206
THE SAME
(Continued).
it.
j I L D words I write, and lettered
in deep pain,
To lay in your loved hand as
love's farewell.
It is the thought we shall not
meet again
Nerves me to write and my whole secret tell.
For when I speak to you, you only jest,
And laughing break the sentence with a kiss,
Till my poor love is never quite confessed,
Nor know you half its tears and tenderness.
When the first darkness and the clouds began
I hid it from you fearing your reproof;
I would not vex your life's high aim and plan
With my poor woman's woe, and held aloof.
But now that all is ended, pride and shame,
My tumults and my joys I may proclaim.
207
J
CI.
THE SAME
(Continued).
12.
I S ended truly, truly as
was best.
Love is a little thing, for
one short day;
You could not make it your
life's only quest,
Nor watch the poor corpse long in its decay.
Go forth, dear, thou hast much to do on earth ;
In life's campaign there waits thee a great part,
Much to be won and conquered of more worth
Than this poor victory of a woman's heart.
For me the daylight of my years is dim.
I seek not gladness, yet shall find content
In such small duties as are learned of Him
Who bore all sorrows, till my youth is spent.
Yet, come what may to me of weal or woe,
I love thee, bless thee, dear, where'er thou go.
208
PART IV.
VITA NOVA.
P»
CII
A DAY IN SUSSEX.
HE dove did lend me
wings. I fled away
From the loud world
which long had
troubled me.
Oh, lightly did I flee
when hoyden May
Threw her wild mantle
on the hawthorn tree.
I left the dusty high
road, and my way
Was through deep meadows, shut with copses
fair.
A choir of thrushes poured its roundelay
From every hedge and every thicket there.
Mild, moonfaced kine looked on, where in
the grass
All neaped with flowers I lay, from noon till eve.
And hares unwitting close to me did pass,
And still the birds sang, and I could not grieve.
Oh, what a blessed thing that evening was !
Peace, music, twilight, all that could deceive
A soul to joy or lull a heart to peace.
It glimmers yet across whole years like these.
211
P 2
cm.
IN ANNIVERSARIO MORTIS.
(.
jj=?|F I can bring no tribute
of fresh tears
To mingle with the
dustwhich covers thee;
If in this latest dawn
of evil years
My rebel eyes with"
hold their sympathy;
If of a truth my thoughts
so barren be
Of their old griefs, so numb to tenderness
That they nor hear nor taste nor feel nor see
The sweetness of thy presence in this place;
If I now drowse, 'tis that the flesh is weak
More than the spirit. See, by thy dear bed
Once more I kneel in sorrow and in love.
See, I still watch by thee if thou shouldst move,
Ifthoushouldstraisethyhandor turn thy head,
Or speak my name : and yet thou dost not
speak.
212
CIV.
THE SAME.
(Continued).
HESE flowers shall be my
offering, living flowers
Which here shall die with thee
in sacrifice,
Flowers from the empty fields
which once were yours
And now are mine. No gold, nor myrrh, nor
spice,
Nor any dead man's offering may suffice.
I love not flowers : but thus to deck a grave
Which has no need of things of greater price.
Life is the only tribute death would have.
Ah, thou art dead. Mine is this fair domain
With all its living beauty and brave shows
Of lawn, and lake, and garden; mine the
increase
Of the year's harvest, the slow growth of trees,
And that fair natural wealth we loved in vain,
Flowers, which shall never more adorn my
house.
2 »3
P3
cv.
THE SAME
(Continued).
]T is not true the dead un*
honoured were
If they returned to life. Nay,
claim thine own,
And see how gladly I, thy
"thankless heir/'
Will yield thee back possession of thy throne.
I am not so in love with riches grown
That such can comfort me. Alas, too long
The fields are furrowed and the wheat is sown
For my sole grief that these should do thee
wrong.
I hold these things not wholly as in fee,
But thinking that perhaps some happy day
We yet may walk together, and devise
Of the old lands we loved, in Paradise,
And I shall give account, as best I may,
How I thy tenant was awhile for thee.
214
CVI.
THE SAME
(Continued),
4.
pH Y ways were not my ways.
Thy life was peace,
And mine has been a battle.
Thou didst store
Thy soul's wealth sternly to
» a sure increase,
And thy revenue's much still swelled to more.
Thou squanderedst nothing on the pomp
ofwar,
The lust of glory. No mad covetous eyes
Were thine upon thy neighbour's lands afar,
His wealth, his wife, his fenceless vanities.
Thou wert a brave, just man, whom all men
knew
And trusted, and some loved, and thou to me
Wktt as a tower of strength, a sanctuary
To which I fled from the world's maddened
crew,
Wounded by me, and there with bloodstained
hands
Clung to the altar of thy innocence.
2 *5
P4
CVII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
5-
H E RE were two with thee in
thine agony,
I and another. In that hour
supreme
We stood beside thy cross and
! gazed at thee,
Waiting till death should wake thee from thy
dream.
Thy hands held both our hands and clung to
them
And drew them to each other. We could see
Thy dumb lips open as to either name
And thy eyes turn to our eyes wistfully.
O eloquent eyes ! Ye were not closed in vain.
Still from the grave ye speak, " Behold a son,
" Behold a mother." From that rite of pain
We two went home together bone of bone
And flesh of flesh, distinguished among men,
Thy witnesses till death shall come again.
2l6
CVIII.
THE LIMIT OF HUMAN KNOW.
LEDGE.
HERE is a vice in
the world's reason^
ing. Man
Has conquered
knowledge. He has
conquered power;
Hehas traced out the
universal plan
Of the earth's being;
and in this last hour
He has unmade the God which he had made.
I cannot doubt but he at length has read
The riddle of the Earth ; that he is wise.
He also hath dominion chartered
Over the lands, the oceans, and the skies,
Which toil and sweat to give him daily bread.
Knowledge he hath, and power upon the earth,
And long ago he had himself been God,
But for the cruel secret of his birth,
Which gave him kindred with the dust he trod,
And for the hideous ending of his mirth,
A flyvblown carrion festering 'neath the sod.
217
CIX.
THE PRIDE OF UNBELIEF.
IHEN I complained
I that I had lost my
hope
Of life eternal with
the eternal God;
"When I refused to
read my horoscope
I In the unchanging
j stars, or claim abode
iWrth powers and
dominations ; but, poor clod,
Clung to the earth and grovelled in my tears,
Because I soon must lie beneath the sod
And close the little number of my years,
Then I was told that pride had barred the way,
And raised this foul rebellion in my head.
Yet, strange rebellion ! I, but yesterday,
Was God's own son in His own likeness bred.
And thrice strange pride ! who thus am cast away
And go forth lost and disinherited.
218
■a
CX.
LAUGHTER AND DEATH.
H E RE is no laughter
in the natural world
Of beast or fish or bird,
though no sad doubt
Of their futurity to
them unfurled
Has dared to check the
mirtlvcompelling
shout.
The lion roars his
solemn thunder out
To the sleeping woods. The eagle screams her
cry.
Even the lark must strain a serious throat
To hurl his blest defiance at the sky.
Fear, anger, jealousy have found a voice.
Love's pain or rapture the brute bosoms swell.
Nature has symbols for her nobler joys,
Her nobler sorrows. W^ho had dared foretell
That only man, by some sad mockery,
Should learn to laugh who learns that he must
die?
2l 9
i
CXI.
THE PRE.ADAMITE WORLD.
HO shall declare the
glory of the World,
The natural World
before man'sform was
seen ?
Fair stainless planet
through the heavens
hurled
And clothed in garx
ments of immortal
green !
what depths of forest girt her! What serene
Pastures were hers for cattle numberless
Owning no lord save her, their guileless queen,
Dear Nature's self who ruled them but to bless !
If there was war in Heaven, peace reigned on
Earth.
Not by disease did the world's life grow tame,
But by the hand of god, in drought or dearth
Or sudden palsy when the lion came.
Death ! Wno should fear him or his mercy sue,
Whose last pang was the first each creature
knew?
220
CXII.
A VISION OF FOLLY.
SAW^ one rushing
madly in pursuit
Of Liberty. With
frenzied steps he
strode.
Old laws and customs
with disdainful foot
He spurned beneath
him inamireof blood.
He stood before the
wondering world a god,
A king, with Freedom for his spouse and
?ueen.
le felt his empire was divine and trod,
As on a footstool, on the necks of men.
Ruin awhile and havoc strewed his path.
He had his day of glory and his fall.
He stood once more upon his father's hearth,
Sated with pride, and there in frenzy worse
Wrought foul dishonour on that honoured
hall,
And left its walls forever with a curse.
221
CXIII.
AMBITION.
HAD ambition once.
Like Solomon,
I asked for wisdom,
deeming wisdom fair,
And with much pains
a little knowledge
won
Of nature's cruelty
and man's despair,
And mostly learned
how vain such learnings were.
Then in my grief I turned to happiness,
And woman's love awhile was all my care,
And I achieved some sorrow and some bliss,
Till love rebelled. Then the mad lust of power
Became my dream, to rule my fellow men j
And I too lorded it my little hour,
And wrought for weal or woe with sword and
pen,
And wounded many, some, alas, my friends.
Now I ask silence. My ambition ends.
222
SK
CXIV.
WRITTEN IN DISTRESS.
E sometimes sit in
darkness. I long while
Have sat there, in a
shadow as of death.
My friends and com/
forters no longer
smile,
And they who grudge
me wrongfully my
breath
Are strong and many. I am bowed beneath
A weight of trouble and unjust reproach
From many fools and friends of little faith.
The world is little worth, yet troubles much.
But I am comforted in this, that I,
Although my face is darkened to men's eyes
And all my life eclipsed with angry wars,
Now see things hidden ; and I seem to spy
New worlds above my heaven. Night is wise
And joy a sun which never guessed the stars.
223
cxv.
A DISAPPOINTMENT.
|PRING,ofasudden,
came to life one day.
Ere this, the winter
had been cold and
chill.
That morning first
the summer air did fill
The world, making
j bleak March seem
I almost May.
The daffodils were blooming golden gay;
The birch trees budded purple on the hill;
The rose, that clambered up the window-sill,
Put forth a crimson shoot. All yesterday
The winds about the casement chilly blew,
But now the breeze that played aboutthe door,
So caught the dead leaves that I thought there
flew
Brown butterflies up from the grassy floor.
But someone said you came not. Ah, too true !
And I, I thought that winter reigned once more.
224
CXVI,
A YEAR AGO.
I YEAR ago I too was
froudof May,
too delighted in the
J blackbird's song.
rWhen the sun shone
J my soul made holiday.
V hen the rain fell I
I felt it as a wrong.
Then for me too the
I world was fresh and
young.
Oh, what a miracle each bluebell was !
How myheart leapedin union withmy tongue,
When first I lit upon a stag's horn moss !
A year ago. Alas, one summer's fire,
One autumn's chill, one winter's discontent,
And now one spring of joy and hope deferred
Have brought me to this pass of undesire
That I behold May's veil of beauty rent
And stand unmoved by sun and flower and bird.
225
q»
k
CXVII.
HE IS NOT A POET.
WOULDnot,ifI
could, be called a poet.
I have no natural love
of the " chaste muse/'
If aught be worth the
doing I would do it;
And others, if they
will, may tell the
news.
I care not for their
laurels but would choose
On the world's field to fight or fall or run.
My soul's ambition will not take excuse
To play the dial rather than the sun.
The faith I held I hold, as when a boy
I left my books for cricket<-bat and gun.
The tales of poets are but scholars' themes.
In my hot youth I held it that a man
Wrth heart to dare and stomach to enjoy
Had better work to his hand in any plan
Of any folly, so the thing were done,
Than in the noblest dreamingof mere dreams.
226
CXVIII.
ON THE SHORTNESS OF TIME.
F I could live without
the thought of death,
Forgetful of Time's
waste, thy soul's decay,
I would not ask for
other joy than breath
With lightand sound
of birds and the sun's
ray,
I could sit on untroubled
day by day
watching the grass grow, and the wild flowers
range
From blue to yellow and from red to grey
In natural sequence as the seasons change.
I could afford to wait, but for the hurt
Of this dull tick of time which chides my ear.
But now I dare not sit with loins ungirt
And staff unlifted, for death stands too near.
I must be up and doing; ay, each minute.
The grave gives time for rest when we are in it.
227
q 2
.J
CXIX.
CHANCLEBURY RING.
J AY what you will,
jthereisnotin the
I world
! A nobler sight than
j from this upper down .
j No rugged landscape
here, no beauty hurled
From its Creator's
I hand as with a frown ;
But a green plain on
which green hills look down
Trim as a garden plot. No other hue
Can hence be seen, save here and there the
brown
Of a square fallow, and the horizon's blue.
Dear checker^work of woods, the Sussex weald .
If a name thrills me yet of things of earth,
That name is thine. How often I have fled
To thy deep hedgerows and embraced each
field,
Each lag, each pasture: fields which gave me
birth
And saw my youth, and which must hold me
dead.
228
SB
cxx.
SONNET IN ASSONANCE.
THOUSANDblue,
bells blossom in the
wood,
Shut in a tangled
brake of briar roses,
And guarded well
from every wanton
foot,
A treasure by no eye
of man beholden,
Noeyebutmine. No other tongue hath spoken
Out to the joyless world what hidden joys
Lie there untasted, mines of wealth unnoted,
While a starved world without lives blank and
void.
Ah, couldst thou know, poor wretch, what
I have known,
See what I saw upon that bank enshrined,
Soft pity had not wholly left thy soul
And tears had dimmed thy hard eyes uninvited.
Eyesthatarecruel'brightwithhunger'sbright'-
ness,
Hunger for beauty, solitude, and peace.
There hadst thou found a beauty and a silence,
Such as nor tongue can tell nor fancy dream.
229
q3
CXXI.
YOUTH.
OUTH, ageless
youth, the old gods'
attribute!
To inherit cheeks a^
tingle with such blood
As wood nymphs
blushed, who to the
first'blown flute
Went out in endless
dancing through
the wood.
To live, and taste of that immortal food
After the wild day's waste prepared for us
By deathless hands, and straightway be re^
newed,
Like the god's entrails upon Caucasus.
To rise at dawn with eye and brain and sense
Clear as the pale green edge where dawn began,
While each bold thought full shapen should
arise,
Cutting the horizon of experience,
Sharp as an obelisk. Ah, wretched man,
'Tis little wonder that the gods are wise.
230
1
jnjr — - Jl —
CXXII.
AGE.
i.
AGE, thou art the
very thief of joy,
For thou hast rifled
many a proud fool
Of all his passions,
hoarded by a rule
Of stern economy.
Him, yet a boy,
Harsh wisdom
governed. Others
turned to toy
Wrth lusty passion. He was chaste and cool
As a young Dorian in Lycurgus' school.
Ah, me ! that thou such souls shouldst dare
annoy.
Thus did he gather him a store of pleasure,
Nor cared to touch what he so hardly won,
But led long years of solitary strife ;
And, when the rest should have consumed
their treasure,
He thought to sit him in the evening sun
And taste the sweet fruits of a sober life.
2 3*
q4
CXXIII.
THE SAME
(Continued).
2.
^UT thou didst come upon him
ere he wist,
A silent highwayman, and take
his all
And leave him naked, when the
night should fall
And all the road was conjured in a mist.
Too well thou keepedest thy unholy tryst,
As long ago that eastern seneschal
Rode all day long to meet at evenfall
Him he had fled ere yet the sun uprist.
But I have spent me like a prodigal
The treasure of my youth, and, long ago,
Have eaten husks among the hungry swine,
And when I meet thee I will straightway fall
Upon thy neck, and if the tears shall flow,
They shall be tears of love for thee and thine.
232
Tf&r-z
CXXIV.
THE VENUS OF MILO.
HAT art thou?
Woman ? Goddess ?
Aphrodite ?
Yet never such as thou
from the cold foam
Of ocean, nor from
cloudy heaven might
come,
"Who was begotten on
her bridal night
In passionate Earth's womb by Man's delight,
When Man was young. I cannot trace in thee
Time's handiwork. Say, rather, where is he
For whom thy face was red which is so white ?
Thou standest ravished, broken, and thy face
Is writ with ancient passions. Thou art dumb
To my new love. Yet, whatsoe'er of good,
Of crime, of pride, of passion, or of grace
In woman is, thou, woman, hast in sum.
Earth's archetypal Eve. All Womanhood.
233
cxxv.
WRITTEN AT FLORENCE.
i.
WORLD, in very
truth thou art too
young,
When wilt thou learn
to wear the garb of
age?
World,with thy cover •
J ing of yellow flowers,
Hast thou forgot what
generations sprung
Out of thy loins and loved thee and are gone ?
Hast thou no place in all their heritage
Where thou dost only weep that I may come
Nor fear the mockery of thy yellow flowers?
O world, in very truth thou art too young.
The heroic wealth of passionate emprize
Built thee fair cities for thy naked plains.
How hast thou set thy summer growth among
The broken stones which were their palaces ?
Hast thou forgot the darkness where he lies
W^ho made thee beautiful, or have thy bees
Found out his gravetobuildtheir honeycombs ?
234
CXXVI.
THE SAME.
(Continued).
2.
jWORLD, in very truth thou
art too young,
They gave thee love who
measured out thy skies,
And, when they found for thee
another star,
Who made a festival and straightway hung
The jewel on thy neck. O merry world,
Hast thou forgot the glory of those eyes
Which first looked love inthine? Thouhasnot
furled
One banner of thy bridal car for them.
O world, in very truth thou art too young.
There was a voice which sang aboutthy spring,
Till winter froze the sweetness of his lips,
And lo, the worms had hardly left his tongue
Before thy nightingales were come again,
O world, what courage hast thou thus to sing ?
Say, has thy merriment no secret pain
No sudden weariness that thou art young ?
235
CXXVII.
PALAZZO PAGANL
HIS is the house
where, twenty years
I ago
i They spent a spring
j and summer. This
I shut gate
! Would lead you to the
terrace, and below
To a rose garden long
■ since desolate.
Here they once lived. How often have I sat
Till it was dusk among the olive trees,
Waitingto hear their coming horse^hoofs grate
Upon the gravel; till the freshening breeze
Bore down a sound of voices. Even yet
A broken echo of their laughter rings
Through the deserted terraces; and see,
Wliile I am speaking, from the parapet
There is a hand put forth, and some one flings
Her very window open overhead.
How sweet it is, this scent of rosemary !
These are the last tears I shall ever shed.
236
CXXVIII.
THE SUBLIME.
i.
O stand upon a windy
pinnacle,
Beneath the infinite
blue of the blue noon,
And underfoot a
valley terrible
As that dim gulf,
where sense and being
swoon
WTien the soul parts ;
a giant valley strewn
Wrth giant rocks ; asleep, and vast, and still,
And far away. The torrent, which has hewn
His pathway through the entrails of the hill,
Now crawls along the bottom and anon
Lifts up his voice, a muffled tremulous roar,
Borne on the wind an instant, and then gone
Back to the caverns of the middle air;
A voice as of a nation overthrown
Wrth beat of drums, when hosts have marched
to war.
237
asm
CXXIX.
THE SAME.
(Continued).
2.
AJTCHING the brink with
J hands and feet and knees,
With trembling heart, and eyes
grown strangely dim,
j A part thyself and parcel of the
• frieze
Of that colossal temple raised to Time,
To gaze on horror, till, as in a crime,
Thou and the rocks become accomplices.
There is no voice, no life 'twixt thee and them.
No life ! Yet, look, far down upon the breeze
Something has passed across the bosom bare
Of the red rocks, a leaf, a shape, a shade,
A living shadow! ay, above thee there,
Weaving majestic circles overhead,
Others are watching. This is the sublime
To be alone, with eagles in the air.
238
cxxx.
A FOREST IN BOSNIA.
|PIRITofTrajan!
Wliat a world is here,
'What remnant of old
Europe in this wood
Of life primaeval rude
as in the year
When thyfirst legions
by the Danube stood.
These are the very
Dacians they subdued,
Swineherds and shepherds clad in skins of deer
And fox and marten still, a bestial brood,
Than their own swine begotten swinelier.
The fair oak/forest, their first heritage,
Pastures them still, and still the hollow oak
Receives them in its bosom. Still o'erhead
Upon the stag'headtops, grown hoar with age,
Calm buzzards sit and ancient ravens croak,
And all with solemn life is tenanted.
239
CXXXI.
ROUMELI HISSAR.
A Sonnet.
jHE empire of the
East, grown dull to
fear
By long companion^
ship with angry fate,
In silent anguish saw
her doom appear
In this dark fortress
built upon the strait,
And Sultan
Mahmoud standing at her gate,
For she must perish. Hissar many a year
Struck terror into all who gazed thereat,
Till in his turn the Turk had learned to wear
The purple and fine linen of the State,
And fell in impotence. These walls to-day,
"With Judas-tree and lilac overgrown,
Move all men's hearts. For close on barbarous
power
Tread lust and indolence, and then decay
Till we forgive. The very German boor,
WTio in his day of fortune moves our scorn,
Purged of his slough, in after ages may
Invite the tears of nations yet unborn.
240
CXXXII.
THE OASIS OF SIDI KHALED.
|OW the earth burns!
Eachpebbleunderfoot
Is as a living thing
with power to wound.
The white sand
quivers, and the foot'
fall mute
Of the slow camels
strikes but gives no
sound,
As though they walked on flame, not solid
ground.
'Tis noon, and the beasts' shadows even have
fled
Back to their feet, and there is fire around
And fire beneath, and overhead the sun.
Pitiful heaven I "What is this we view ?
Tall trees, a river, pools, where swallows fly.
Thickets of oleander where doves coo,
Shades, deep as midnight, greenness for tired
eyes.
Hark, how the light winds in the palnvtops
sigh.
Oh, this is rest. Oh, this is paradise.
241
ri
CXXXIII.
TO THE BEDOUIN ARABS.
HILDRENof
Shem ! Firstborn of
Noah's race,
But still forever chiV
dren;atthedoor
Of Eden found, un^
conscious of disgrace,
And loitering on while
all are gone before ;
Too proud to dig; too
careless to be poor;
Taking the gifts of God in thanklessness,
Not rendering aught, nor supplicating more,
Nor arguingwithHim when Hehides His face.
Yours is the rain and sunshine, and the way
Of an old wisdom by our world forgot,
The courage of a day which knew not death.
Well may we sons of Japhet in dismay
Pause in our vain mad fight for life and breath,
Beholding you. I bow and reason not.
242
A
CXXXIV.
GIBRALTAR.
jEVEN weeks of sea,
and twice seven days
of storm
Upon the huge At-
lantic, and once more
We ride into still water
and the calm
Of a sweet evening
screened by either
shore
Of Spain and Barbary. Our toils are o'er,
Our exile is accomplished. Once again
We look on Europe, mistress as of yore
Of the fair earth and of the hearts of men.
Ay, this is the famed rock, which Hercules
And Goth and Moor bequeathed us. At this
door
England stands sentry, God ! to hear the shrill
Sweet treble of her fifes upon the breeze
And at the summons of the rock gun's roar
To see her red coats marching from the hill.
M3
r2
cxxxv.
TO ONE, WITH A SPRING
NOSEGAY.
EE, Silvia, here I send
you these Spring
flowers,
Though Summer's
come already and full
June.
The year is late, like
this new love of ours,
And all the sweeter
that it came less soon.
In the oak-woods I gathered them at noon,
And heard the thrushes sing without a stop.
The sturdy cuckoo had not changed his tune,
But told his old wild loves still full of hope.
Here bluebells you will find and margarets,
And clovers pink, and periwinkles blue,
And royal broom of lost Plantagenets,
And lilac sprays, your own, and all for you.
Yes, all for you, and with them this poor song
From a true heart their greenest leaves among.
244
— . - n -■■ ..,
a ^383553§
FgRT?
Vv- T IP 2 v • 'A
xi^
^H
J
vj
a3 ,
CXXXVI.
TO ONE, AT THE PARTING OF
THE WAYS.
ERE our roads part.
Go thou by the green
valley,
Thy youth before thee
ana tny river Nile.
My path lies o'er the
desert, and my galley
Has rougher seas to
^ plough (and days) the
id while.
I know not what to offer you ; a smile,
A blessing, a farewell ? I dare not dally
Even with the thought of tears. 'Twas but a
mile
We walked together, and such things were
folly.
I will not hope, who have no faith in fate,
That I shall you remember or you me
Beyond to-morrow. Yet, perhaps, the wind
Blowing some morning through its Eastern
gate
May tell you of my fortune; and, behind
The Western star some evening I may see,
As in a vision of far days more kind,
Your dear eyes watching while the night grows
blind.
245
r3
CXXXVII.
TO ONE IN A GARDEN.
F I were other than,
alas, I am,
A soul in strife, whom
banded foemen vex,
If toil were folly and
good deeds a sham,
And hydra wrong
had shed its serpent
necks.
And life's dark pro.'
blems could no more perplex.
How sweet it were, forgotten of all blame,
In that far garden which your summer decks
To dream with you that grief was but a name.
Ay, dream ! For waking which of us were wise
To spell griefs epitaph ? Some tears must be
Even in herald hour of your sunrise.
And in the night? Ah, child, what misery,
Think you, awaits us when life's flood gates
strain
To the full deluge of the descending rain ?
246
CXXXVIII.
TO ONE, ON HER BIRTHDAY.
iOW shall I choose to
wish you happiness
On this day or another?
Your life's way
Has passed already far
beyond our guess
Who only watch and
wait for you and pray.
Our love is but the
creature of man's clay,
And you have chosen grief for your soul's bliss.
How shall I offer you mere joy to-day,
Nor seem for greater wealth to bring you less ?
You have a world to win by faith sublime.
You have a heart to break for human woe.
That which you seek was never seen in Time.
That you shall find I dare not seek to know.
Yet will I wish you this, for your new birth,
You stillmay love : the sweetest thingon Earth.
247
CXXXIX.
TO THE SAME, ON HER BIRTH,
DAY.
EAR secret, if my
wishes could have
wings,
And you had need of
aught for happiness,
How would I fly to
gather costly things
In lands afar and blue
seas fathomless !
What buried gems ;
What long-'drowned argosies ;
What secrets shut in passionate lutestrings ;
What dust of martyrs agonised in bliss;
What broken sceptres in the hands of kings !
How would I fashion these for your delight
In tales of grief and love for ever young,
Till you too dreamed : But that my sluggard
wit
Falters, and time is heavy on my tongue,
And that you scorn all dreams but the sole
right
Of your soul's truth triumphant over wrong.
248
CXL.
TO ONE, WITH HIS SONNETS.
[IS is the book. For
evil and for good,
': WTiat my life was in
i it is written plain.
These are no dreams,
; but things of flesh and
blood,
The past that lived
and snail not live
again.
This is the book. I dare not bid you read.
Too much of my poor soul you would unlock.
Your own soul, if it tender were, might bleed.
I could not bear that you should only mock.
My life lies here. And yet in vain, dear heart,
The tale is told. One page it yearns to see,
One play where one best actor should find part.
But that, alas for love ! shall never be.
Yet, if a sign you seek between these lines.
One hidden lies for you, a sign of signs.
249
CXLI.
A NEW DEDICATION.
O her the sweetest,
fairest, worthiest one,
Who the inspirer is
of my new praise,
Whom lately once,
one Autumn afters
noon,
I walked with nor
told aught a lover
says,
And yet who knows I love her in all ways
A maiden dreams : the suppliant at her throne,
The counsellor of strength, the lord of lays.
Loyal to chastity and her alone,
These rhymes I dedicate. Oh, if there be
Still in this world of vanished creeds and kings
Some faith in royal blood and right divine,
Some lingering reverence paid to majesty,
Here seek it and here find it, for it clings
To each hushed verse like incense to a shrine.
250
HEREendtheLovcLyricsandSongsof Pro/
teus, "Written by Wilfrid Scawen Blunt; with
the Love'Sonnets of Proteus by the same Au^
thor. Printed by William Morris at the Kelnv
scott Press, Upper Mall, Hammersmith, in the
County of Middlesex, and finished on the 26th
day of January of the year 1892.
Sold by Reeves & Turner, 196 Strand, London.
251
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